Florida lawmakers are scheduled to discuss a measure Tuesday designed to curb the prescription of mental-health drugs to children in state care. Senate Bill 2718, also known as the Gabriel Myers Bill, would allow officials to more closely monitor the powerful psychiatric drugs dispensed to Florida foster care children.
The heightened risk of teen suicide doesn’t vary among users of different antidepressants, a new study finds. Researchers say the finding supports the FDA’s current “black box” warning on all antidepressants detailing the increased risk of suicide attempts and suicides in children and teens who start to take the drugs. A “black box” warning is the FDA’s most severe warning label.
All psychotropic drug effects occur by disabling the brain. Because a child becomes more subdued does not mean that there has been any real progress. The child has not learned any new skills. They have not learned self-control, they have merely been chemically strait jacketed. People are not understanding the damaging effects of psychiatric drugs on the brains and development of children.
According to the National Institute of Drug Abuse (NIDA)’s survey the National Survey on Drug Use and Health, in 2008 15.2 million Americans age 12 and older had taken a prescription pain reliever, tranquilizer, stimulant, or sedative for nonmedical purposes at least once in the year. Addiction to and the abuse of prescription drugs, also known as “pill popping,” has become a national trend.
A lawsuit filed last week accuses Johnson & Johnson of conspiring with pharmaceutical consultant Omnicare in an effort to push J&J drugs on nursing home residents, and violating federal Medicaid laws in the process. As a result of the scheme, “residents were overcharged for their medications, had additional medications administered and were unlawfully switched to Johnson & Johnson drugs,” all in the name of increasing revenue, according to the lawsuit.