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Ritalin Debate: Some Experts Doubt Existence of ADHD
Cybercast News Service (CNSNews.com) ^ | April 18, 2003 | Patrick Goodenough

Posted on 04/18/2003 12:38:09 PM PDT by FreeRadical

Pacific Rim Bureau (CNSNews.com) - The debate over attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and the drugging of children diagnosed with it has been rekindled in Australia, one of several countries to have followed the U.S. trend over recent decades.

A youth conference in the eastern city of Brisbane this week was told that no proof has been found that ADHD exists at all.

U.S. psychologist Dr. Bob Jacobs told the Youth Affairs Network Queensland conference that doctors and pharmaceutical companies had turned behavioral problems in children into a disorder.

He voiced concern that misdiagnoses resulted in youngsters being prescribed powerful drugs like Ritalin, which may affect their long-term mental and physical development.

In a radio interview afterwards, Jacobs - who is on the advisory board of the International Center for the Study of Psychiatry and Psychology - said his conclusions had been made as a result of his own observations during many years in practice, working with children and families.

He cited cases where parents reported that their ADHD-diagnosed children could not pay attention - but then those same children could play video games for hours without being distracted.

Sometimes where parents made changes in the way they were doing things, the symptoms would go away.

"A real disease doesn't go away when somebody else does something," he argued.

Jacobs said experts had put labels on different behaviors and called them a disease.

"There's no proof. Nobody has ever presented any evidence of a condition called ADHD, except to say all these children are hyperactive; all these children are inattentive, and therefore they all have the disease. It's the 'and therefore' that I'm concerned about."

Jacobs acknowledged that many parents would disagree with him. Parents tend to believe what has become the mainstream view, in part because the drugs prescribed for ADHD do work in that they make the child more docile and more compliant.

"The child's not getting into trouble at school any more. The child's easier to manage at home, so we say, well this is great, it works."

Also, parents struggling with a behavior problem were made to feel better. Instead of feeling inadequate as parents, they felt they were now struggling with a sick child and doing the best they could.

Money trail

In the United States in 2001, pharmaceutical companies made more than $600 million in profits just on stimulant drugs used for attention deficit disorders.

"If ADHD doesn't exist, those hundreds of millions of dollars in profits go away."

"You have to follow the money," agreed Peyton Knight, legislative director at the American Policy Center, a Virginia-based think tank.

"It's big money," he said by phone late Thursday. "The more diagnoses there are every year the more Ritalin and other mind-altering drugs they are going to be able to market and sell."

Many would vehemently disagree with the arguments against the existence of ADHD, he said.

"But it's never been validated as a disease," Knight said. "It's arbitrary."

"The number of diagnoses has risen exponentially over the past decade. It's not like some epidemic is sweeping the nation like a flu virus. It's just a matter of diagnoses going up because of the popularity of diagnosing children with ADHD," he said.

"In today's society, parents look for the easy way out. If their kids are unruly, we give them a pill and it sedates them. That becomes a very easy thing to do and if a doctor tells them to do this, they feel good about it."

Knight said there was a fairly sizeable grassroots citizens' movement in the United States questioning these issues, and more parents and teachers were becoming aware of the problems.

Unfortunately a similar movement had yet to take hold in the scientific community, although there were some bold specialists who disagreed with the wider-held views.

One of them is neurologist Dr. Fred Baughman Jr., who in a 1998 letter to the then Attorney General Janet Reno, called the representation of ADHD as a disease and the drugging of millions of normal children "the single, biggest heath care fraud in U.S. history."

Massive increase in drug use

According to Baughman, 500,000 children were diagnosed ADHD in 1985 and between 5 and 7 million were today.

Substantial growth has also been reported in Australia, a country of just 19 million people, where it's estimated that at least 50,000 children are now on drugs prescribed for ADHD.

A report in the Medical Journal of Australia last November said Australia and New Zealand have the third-highest rate in the world of the drug use, after the United States and Canada.

Unlike the United States, where Ritalin (methylphenidate) is most often prescribed, in Australia dexamphetamine is more widely used.

University of Queensland figures show that legal use of dexamphetamine in Australia has risen from 8.3 million tablets prescribed in 1984 to 38.4 million tablets in 2001. Over the same period Ritalin prescriptions rose from 1.5 million tablets to 19.3 million.

The federal government early this year approved use in Australia of long-acting Ritalin-LA, which is said to be effective for longer than the usual four-hour period for standard Ritalin.

Rosemary Boon, a child psychologist in Sydney for more than 20 years, acknowledged in a recent article that the drugs were effective in settling the child and this benefited teachers, parents and classmates. But there was little benefit to the afflicted child, she added.

Boon does not argue that ADHD doesn't exist, but says it can be managed with the help of diet, exercise, behavior modification, stress management, identification of "triggers" of the symptoms, and a supportive family environment.

Critics list among the problems with drugs like Ritalin the fact children on them tend not to grow as tall as they might otherwise. There are also concerns that a child's intelligence, creativity and spontaneity may be dampened.

The Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists says medication should not be the first line of intervention for the vast majority of children. Alternatives should be looked into first.

On its website, Novartis, the pharmaceutical company that manufactures Ritalin, describes ADHD as "a physical disorder caused by differences in how the child's brain works."

Novartis has an article in the April-May edition of its journal, Pathways, arguing for the existence of ADHD.

It quotes Prof. Russell Barkley of the Medical University of South Carolina as saying that ADHD is not overdiagnosed in the United States.

"We have more diagnosis now than before due to better public awareness and greater referrals," he said.


TOPICS: Culture/Society
KEYWORDS: adhd; australia; drugs; education; health; ritalin; youth
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Putting this up asap to avoid double post, back in 10 with crosslinks to related material.....
1 posted on 04/18/2003 12:38:09 PM PDT by FreeRadical
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To: FreeRadical
Count me in among the concerned. Kids being force-fed something an adult could spend years in jail for unlawfully possessing... there is something wrong with this picture, and it's not a healthy sign.
2 posted on 04/18/2003 12:42:24 PM PDT by thoughtomator (I predict hysteria at the UN)
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To: FreeRadical
Well, I was a 'hyperactive' kid, inattentive, unruly, non-compliant, etc... and I never had to take any pharmaceuticals to change my behavior - and yet, now I am a responsible, well-adjusted adult... ;0)
3 posted on 04/18/2003 12:43:54 PM PDT by Chad Fairbanks (Some days, it's just not worth gnawing through the straps...)
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To: FreeRadical
I like Red Foremans cure for ADHD "A foot up your ass!!!"
4 posted on 04/18/2003 12:45:30 PM PDT by HEY4QDEMS
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To: FreeRadical
Here's a little more info:
CNSNews Commentary: Drugging our Children to Death
CNSNews Reporting: Federal Gov Sets up National Center on ADHD

FreeRepublic, related article from Australia:
ADHD just 'bad behaviour': US expert (drug company fraud?)
FreeRepublic, related article from Washington Times, Feb. 2003:
Research Questions Ritalin Use
5 posted on 04/18/2003 12:50:38 PM PDT by FreeRadical (Buy Kids Books & Guns. Help them love liberty & hate the nanny state.)
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To: FreeRadical
I work with kids at 45 different school locations and I can tell you .. the number of kids that are medicated is astounding.. mainly boys. There are so many children that have a terrible time controlling behavior.. When we address behavioral issues with some of the parents .. they tend to say in the presence of their children, that they can't help it.. that either they are on new meds.. they forgot their meds or we should excuse their poor behavior because they are ADHD and that it's part of their 'diagnosis'.. kids are given a pass..

One additional thing, if these kids are diagnosed as ADHD ..they are classified as special needs.. the schools received additional funding for special needs kids and it is in the best interest of the schools to have special needs kids identified.

6 posted on 04/18/2003 12:55:42 PM PDT by Zipporah
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To: FreeRadical
Sometimes where parents made changes in the way they were doing things, the symptoms would go away.

DUH! Parents today are just weenies - trying to "befriend" their darlings and afraid to be parents!

My son was hyper growing up. He was dealt with consistantly and evenly. When he got "wound up" I made sure he did a few laps up and down our street to burn off his excess energy and it always worked.

He also learned the value of discipline. He's a fine adult today and a great parent.

7 posted on 04/18/2003 12:56:07 PM PDT by Humidston (Do not remove this tag under penalty of law)
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To: Zipporah
What percentage of the drugged kids are from single-parent homes?
8 posted on 04/18/2003 12:57:46 PM PDT by bvw
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To: FreeRadical
I have ADD. I know it exists.
9 posted on 04/18/2003 12:59:37 PM PDT by Lazamataz (c) Entertaining beautiful women since 1972 ! :^)
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To: FreeRadical
What were we talking about?
10 posted on 04/18/2003 12:59:53 PM PDT by Lazamataz (c) Entertaining beautiful women since 1972 ! :^)
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To: FreeRadical
According to Baughman, 500,000 children were diagnosed ADHD in 1985 and between 5 and 7 million were today.

That many diagnoses in one day? Good grief!

11 posted on 04/18/2003 1:00:25 PM PDT by Lil'freeper (;))
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To: bvw
I would say that the majority of medicated kids are from single parent homes. Also, from families that are at-risk.. either being low income or single parent.
12 posted on 04/18/2003 1:02:06 PM PDT by Zipporah
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To: Lazamataz
Yes it does exist.

While I'm sure that the drugs are overused as behavioral restraints, there is an actual neurological problem that is ADHD, that is very painful for the sufferers.

The few instances where it is appropriate and useful should not be disparaged.
13 posted on 04/18/2003 1:04:46 PM PDT by Judith Anne (God bless our soldiers with swift victory...)
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To: Judith Anne
One clue ADD does exist is this: To those who do not suffer from ADD, ritalin acts like a recreational stimulant, somewhat like methamphetamines.

However, to a person such as myself, I get NO recreational drug effect from ritalin. All that happens is I can concentrate better.

14 posted on 04/18/2003 1:07:12 PM PDT by Lazamataz (c) Entertaining beautiful women since 1972 ! :^)
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To: Zipporah
I'm curious to know how many cases of ADD/ADHD are diagnosed at a Military School. hmmmm?
15 posted on 04/18/2003 1:09:22 PM PDT by HEY4QDEMS
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To: HEY4QDEMS
HEY4QDEMS

Everybody's got a cool screen name but me. :o(

16 posted on 04/18/2003 1:11:19 PM PDT by Lazamataz (c) Entertaining beautiful women since 1972 ! :^)
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To: Lazamataz
How does your belief that you have some condition or another provide proof that it exists?
17 posted on 04/18/2003 1:15:12 PM PDT by US admirer
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To: FreeRadical
My stepson has been diagnosed with ADHD. One interesting bit of info: Once something has his attention, he only focuses on that one thing...everything else is blocked-out completely.
I watched as he walked home from the bus stop after school, and saw that a fly captured his attention...he followed it out into oncoming traffic trying to swat at it. That's just one danger of this "disorder". This helped us decide, with the advice of his doctor, that medications pose the lesser risk.
Now, I'm not an advocate for medicating kids to make life easier on teachers or parents. But in my boy's (Bughunter)case, medications are working--for him.

rook


18 posted on 04/18/2003 1:16:07 PM PDT by Noahs Rook
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To: Judith Anne
The few instances where it is appropriate and useful should not be disparaged.

The problem is that for some folks (such as will soon be crowding this thread), ADD is primarily an ideological issue. As such, its reality must be denied or minimized. We see above, and will see below, all sorts of calls for punishment and discipline instead of medication. For whatever reason, these same folks tend to end up on the public education-bashing threads -- there's a link of some sort.

The fact is, I know several kids who are on medication because they need it. It helps them to function.

19 posted on 04/18/2003 1:16:25 PM PDT by r9etb
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To: US admirer
How does your belief that you have some condition or another provide proof that it exists?

It is anecdotal evidence of an effect observed by independant researchers performing double-blind experiments.

20 posted on 04/18/2003 1:16:54 PM PDT by Lazamataz (c) Entertaining beautiful women since 1972 ! :^)
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