TeenScreen's Evil Sister Sued by Texas Attorney General

TMAP is the Texas Medication Algorithm Project -- a TeenScreen-style program concocted by drug companies to influence government officials to push the newest most expensive antipsychotic drugs. This program and TeenScreen were "recommended" by the President's New Freedom Commission on Mental Health. Both are tools of Big Pharma -- the pharmaceutical industry.

But a whistleblower has initiated a huge lawsuit by Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott against Johnson & Johnson and five related companies, claiming that an official was paid under the table to recommend a certain drug with no superiority over other drugs available for the same purpose except for it's greater price tag.

Read about the case by clicking here. It's a fascinating story, and another crack in the Big Pharma phacade.

Federal Government Lends A Helping Hand To Robber Baron Pharmaceutical Companies

A fascinating article in the Online Journal has exposed an egregious government shenanigan designed to provide a free marketing campaign for the multi-billion dollar per year Big Pharma pharmaceutical industry.

"Under the guise of combating the stigma of mental illness, the U.S. government will soon begin a massive campaign of psychiatric indoctrination, designed to increase the acceptance of psychiatric chemical imbalance theories and labeling, and to pave the way for national psychiatric screening, driving more Americans into seeking psychiatric drug treatment," according to the article.

It's always amazing to see what lengths these insanely rich mega-corporations will go to in their attempt to covertly promote their dangerous and controversial psychiatric mood drugs and antidepressants -- especially in view of the increasing resistance to forthright promotion of the products as the public becomes more aware and informed of the fact that these "antidepressants" actually promote suicide and homicide.

Evidence Mounts on Antidepressant-Suicide Link

The current debate isn't really on whether antidepressants cause suicide, but rather which antidepressants cause it more often! In a recent article in Medscape medical news, that issue was seen as an important part of a Finnish study, which was originally published in the Archives of General Psychiatry.

"Among suicidal subjects who had ever used antidepressants, the current use of any antidepressant was associated with a markedly increased risk of attempted suicide..." according to the article.

This study and most others still ignore the obvious link between antidepressants and homicide/violence. But it's a step in the right direction.

The effect is being felt, too. Yesterday the FDA stated that they are expanding the "black-box" warning label on antidepressants to include young adults as potential victims of suicide or suicidal thinking. This is a BIG step in the right direction. There has been a black box warning (so called because it must be in a black box on the product) warning about this reaction to the drug in children and young adults for several years already.

Xanax-Crazed Boys Become Violent

KHOU.com, a Houston television station, carries this story about a group of young boys that became unspeakably violent with a Hispanic boy they captured. One has already been sentenced to life in prison. The other just got a sentence of 90 years, and will be eligible for parole in 30. But the real story is hidden in the copy. We've pasted the first part of the KHOU article, down to where the truth is revealed. And guess what? It's exactly what this whole blog is about. If you want to read the rest of the article, click here.

A 17-year-old suburban teen was sentenced Monday to 90 years in prison in the brutal attack of a Hispanic boy who was beaten, kicked, stomped, burned and sodomized with the plastic pole of a patio umbrella.

Keith Turner was the second teen convicted of aggravated sexual assault in the April attack at a house in Spring, north of Houston. David Henry Tuck, 18, was convicted and sentenced to life in prison on Nov. 16.

Turner was convicted late Friday after about 90 minutes of deliberations. The jury took about five hours over two days to reach the sentence of 90 years.

Turner will have to serve at least 30 years before becoming eligible for parole.

Although Turner was the younger of the assailants and didn’t have the history of racial attacks that colored Tuck’s past, it was his idea to use the patio umbrella pole in the attack.

Turner, Tuck, the victim and two other teens were partying at a house in Spring, drinking and taking cocaine and Xanax...

From The Atlanta Journal Constitution

The Atlanta Journal Constitution
Drugs for preschoolers? Hit alarm

The controversy over using medications to tame easily distracted and hyperactive schoolchildren hasn't stopped millions of parents from asking doctors to prescribe the powerful stimulants for their children.

The benefits of the medication — better school performance and a calmer child — outweigh the risks, many parents believe.

However, the most recent trend of prescribing Ritalin, Adderall, Concerta and other controlled medications for preschoolers ought to alarm federal regulators, especially now that some studies are suggesting low doses of the drugs could be helpful in very young children with moderate to severe forms of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD.

Such "off-label" use of stimulants for children younger than age 6 is prohibited by the Food and Drug Administration. Yet a study in the Journal of the American Medical Association in 2000 estimated at least 200,000 preschoolers were getting prescriptions for the drugs. Most experts believe the number has since doubled.

Caution is all the more important because researchers are finally starting to compile data on the use of the drugs in children 3 to 6 years old.

In one study, 40 percent of the children who took Ritalin developed side effects. About 11 percent of the children were withdrawn from the 70-week study because of severe problems, including irritability, weight loss, insomnia and slowed growth. Those are rates well above what happens to school-age children who experience similar side effects.

Still, Dr. Scott Kollins, a Duke University psychologist, believes limited use of Ritalin and other stimulants should not be ruled out in very young patients with extreme cases of hyperactivity. Small doses of the drug significantly improved behavior in about half the children in the study. "It's very clear there is a set of kids for whom this will be very important," Kollins told the Scripps Howard News Service.

That echoes the justification pediatricians and child psychiatrists used decades ago when Ritalin first came on the market. The drug was supposed to be prescribed only in the most extreme cases and for only a few years, until children outgrew the brain chemistry problem thought to cause the disorder. Researchers estimate 3 percent to 5 percent of children have ADHD.

But over the last 20 years, use of the stimulants became commonplace, with many elementary and middle school teachers reporting at least a third of their male students taking Ritalin or one of the other drugs daily. Previous studies have indicated that metro Atlanta is a hotbed for prescriptions in school-age children.

More recently, advertising campaigns by the drug manufacturers have emphasized that older children and adults could improve their performance in college or on the job by taking the medication.

There is little question that drugs are effective at helping regulate brain activity. But they are powerful compounds, even when prescribed in low doses, and their long-term effects are still largely unknown. Using stimulants instead of teaching children with mild forms of the disorder how to modify behavior remains controversial.

The FDA should post stronger warning labels and notices to reinforce to parents and physicians alike that widespread use of these stimulants in preschoolers is not encouraged.

— Mike King, for the editorial board

From The Atlanta Journal Constitution

The Atlanta Journal Constitution
Drugs for preschoolers? Hit alarm

The controversy over using medications to tame easily distracted and hyperactive schoolchildren hasn't stopped millions of parents from asking doctors to prescribe the powerful stimulants for their children.

The benefits of the medication — better school performance and a calmer child — outweigh the risks, many parents believe.

However, the most recent trend of prescribing Ritalin, Adderall, Concerta and other controlled medications for preschoolers ought to alarm federal regulators, especially now that some studies are suggesting low doses of the drugs could be helpful in very young children with moderate to severe forms of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD.

Such "off-label" use of stimulants for children younger than age 6 is prohibited by the Food and Drug Administration. Yet a study in the Journal of the American Medical Association in 2000 estimated at least 200,000 preschoolers were getting prescriptions for the drugs. Most experts believe the number has since doubled.

Caution is all the more important because researchers are finally starting to compile data on the use of the drugs in children 3 to 6 years old.

In one study, 40 percent of the children who took Ritalin developed side effects. About 11 percent of the children were withdrawn from the 70-week study because of severe problems, including irritability, weight loss, insomnia and slowed growth. Those are rates well above what happens to school-age children who experience similar side effects.

Still, Dr. Scott Kollins, a Duke University psychologist, believes limited use of Ritalin and other stimulants should not be ruled out in very young patients with extreme cases of hyperactivity. Small doses of the drug significantly improved behavior in about half the children in the study. "It's very clear there is a set of kids for whom this will be very important," Kollins told the Scripps Howard News Service.

That echoes the justification pediatricians and child psychiatrists used decades ago when Ritalin first came on the market. The drug was supposed to be prescribed only in the most extreme cases and for only a few years, until children outgrew the brain chemistry problem thought to cause the disorder. Researchers estimate 3 percent to 5 percent of children have ADHD.

But over the last 20 years, use of the stimulants became commonplace, with many elementary and middle school teachers reporting at least a third of their male students taking Ritalin or one of the other drugs daily. Previous studies have indicated that metro Atlanta is a hotbed for prescriptions in school-age children.

More recently, advertising campaigns by the drug manufacturers have emphasized that older children and adults could improve their performance in college or on the job by taking the medication.

There is little question that drugs are effective at helping regulate brain activity. But they are powerful compounds, even when prescribed in low doses, and their long-term effects are still largely unknown. Using stimulants instead of teaching children with mild forms of the disorder how to modify behavior remains controversial.

The FDA should post stronger warning labels and notices to reinforce to parents and physicians alike that widespread use of these stimulants in preschoolers is not encouraged.

— Mike King, for the editorial board

Throwing The Ship In Reverse

Quote from below article: "Instead of dealing with the overprescription of drug cocktails for children, our government is telling us we have a mental health crisis, and the remedy is universal mental health screening. A major government campaign is now under way, sweetened with federal grants, to subject all children to mental health screening."

https://www.copleynews.com/

Copley News Service
December 1, 2006
Parents worry about prescription drugs, too
By: Phyllis Schlafly

Methamphetamine and marijuana aren't the only drugs parents worry about. The problems caused by prescription combinations called "drug cocktails" have finally broken into the national news stream.

A recent Page 1 of the New York Times described Stephen, age 15, who takes antidepressants Zoloft and Desyrel, plus anticonvulsant Lamictal to moderate his moods, plus the stimulant Focalin XR to improve concentration. His brother Jacob, age 14, takes Focalin XR for concentration, plus the anticonvulsant Depakote to moderate his moods, plus the antipsychotic Risperdal to reduce anger, plus Catapres to induce sleep.

Over the last three years, each boy has been prescribed 28 different psychiatric drugs and has seen 11 psychiatrists. Gone are the days when a visit to a psychiatrist meant lying on a couch to recite your troubles. Treatment today means taking prescription drugs, lots of them.

More than 3 million children are using the most commonly prescribed drug, Ritalin, and it is routinely combined with other drugs. Last year, 1.6 million children and teenagers were given at least two psychiatric drugs in combination, and 500,000 were given at least three.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration requires manufacturers to prove the safety of each drug. But hardly any studies have examined the safety or effectiveness of drugs used in combination.

The American Journal of Psychiatry in 2003 found only six controlled trials of two-drug combinations, four of which failed to show any benefit, and a fifth showed bad side effects. Scientific studies of combinations of three or more drugs are nonexistent.

There are no studies showing long-term safety of psychiatric drugs used on children or the effect on children's developing brains and bodies. The vast majority of these drugs are not FDA-approved for use in children, but they are prescribed for children nevertheless.

Two of the three classes of these drugs are under the FDA's stringent warnings for suicide and violence. They also interfere with learning, causing violence, neurological problems, diabetes and heart attacks.

Ritalin is prescribed to address what is called attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, a disorder first defined in 1980. The pediatric guidelines for diagnosing ADHD are subjective, such as, child often has difficulty awaiting his turn, occasionally may do things compulsively, easily distracted from tasks, fails to give close attention to details, and makes careless mistakes.

A few years later, ADHD was classified as a disability and a federal cash incentive program was initiated for low-income families with children who are said to have ADHD. A family could get $450 a month for each child diagnosed with ADHD, with the cost of treatment and medication for low-income children covered by Medicaid.

The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, passed in 1990, mandates that "eligible children receive access to special education and related services." The school is required to craft an Individualized Education Plan to accommodate each child, which may include drugs prescribed by a medical doctor.

The U.S. Department of Education classified ADHD as a handicap, and in 1991 schools began receiving education grants of $400 a year for each ADHD child.

Since labeling kids ADHD brings more money to the schools, it's not surprising that schools often pressure parents to get an ADHD diagnosis and put their child on Ritalin. School have also found it useful to deal with behavioral and discipline problems by giving boys a drug to get them to sit down, shut up, and do what they're told.

The FDA reported on Feb. 8 that 25 people (including 19 children) died and 54 suffered serious cardiovascular problems after taking drugs prescribed to treat ADHD between 1999 and 2003. An FDA advisory panel finally voted in favor of requiring the famous "black box" warning on these drugs.

Instead of dealing with the overprescription of drug cocktails for children, our government is telling us we have a mental health crisis, and the remedy is universal mental health screening. A major government campaign is now under way, sweetened with federal grants, to subject all children to mental health screening.

The screening usually means having the child fill out a survey about his own behavior. If his answers don't comport with what the so-called experts want, the kid can be referred for treatment, and treatment usually includes medication.

It's up to parents to stop this unscientific, ineffective, and dangerous government intrusion into the minds and values of our children. State laws should require parental consent for all mental health screening, and Congress should pass the Child Medication Safety Act, to prohibit schools from denying entry to a child whose parents choose not to put him on drugs.

Phyllis Schlafly is a lawyer, conservative political analyst and the author of the newly revised and expanded "Supremacists." She can be contacted by e-mail at phyllis@eagleforum.org.

---

What can a person DO about it right now using the keyboard their fingers are on?
For starters, get this petition into the hands of everyone possible: http://www.petitiononline.com/TScreen/petition.html
Not enough Americans know about this grand psychiatric / pharmaceutical / government plan. But watch out when they do!

++

The Shoe Drops

This quote is from a news article on CNN, regarding the death of Anna Nicole Smith's son:

A private pathologist concluded that Daniel Smith died from a lethal combination of methadone and two antidepressants. Official toxicology results have not been publicly released.

So we know he is another victim of psych drugs. Prozac does more than cause depression. It kills.

Letter To The Editor In Fort Madison, Iowa

Daily Democrat

Fort Madison, Iowa

November 10, 2006

Parents need to check out this TeenScreen program

To the parents of students at Ft. Madison & Central Lee Schools:

I discovered recently that both of these schools participate in the TeenScreen program. It's a psychological evaluation given to middle school and high school students. Central Lee sends home a permission slip, but the permission slip gives the parent no idea of the content of the test or the repercussions. Below is an idea of some of the questions on the test.

Has there been a time when nothing was fun for you and you just weren't interested in anything?

Has there been a time when you felt you couldn't do anything well or that you weren't as good-looking or as smart as other people?

How often did your parents get annoyed or upset with you because of the way you were feeling or acting?

Have you often felt very nervous when you've had to do things in front of people?

Have you often worried a lot before you were going to play a sport or game or do some other activity?

Have you tried to kill yourself in the last year?

Are you still thinking of killing yourself?

Have you thought seriously about killing yourself?

I can't imagine any normal teenager that hasn't experienced the first five of these questions. This test is billed as a suicide prevention test. However, it goes much further than that. From the results of this test students are labeled with:

Social Phobia

Panic Disorder

Anxiety

Obsessive Compulsive Disorder

Active Suicide Ideation

Passive Suicide Ideation

Along with these so-called disorders goes the desire to put the teen on psychotropic drugs. According to the web sites I checked there is a 84-94% misdiagnosis rate with this test. I suggest all parents go to Google and type in ‘Teen Screen' and read through the various web sites. By typing in this web site, you can read the test in its entirety: http://www.psychsearch.net/teenscreen_lawsuit/31_4.pdf As you can see, you have to have Adobe Acrobat Reader to view this site. If I had known what was in these tests I would never have allowed my children to take them.

I am blessed with children who have a lot of common sense and a healthy sense of self-esteem. My daughter said a teacher stopped her in the hall and wanted to discuss the results of her test. My daughter told her the test was stupid and she wasn't interested in discussing it: end of discussion. Her comment to me was that “the guy who designed this test must have been high.” My son said the test was ridiculously long and he didn't read it, just randomly answered the questions. His was kicked out by the computer as unreliable. He was quite pleased with himself.

In the interests of your children, please check it out.

Jeannie Hetzer

Ft. Madison

Mom Wallops Teenscreen Right Between The Eyes

Now Playing: Teresa Rhoades, a mother from Indiana, wallops TeenScreen right between the eyes. Teresa and her husband, Michael, sued in federal court because their daughter Chelsea was screened by TeenScreen and diagnosed with two mental disorders - all without her parent's knowledge.

You can see the video here: www.psychsearch.net/teenscreen.html

We should give thanks to Teresa and others like her who have stood up against TeenScreen from the start - initially as lone voices that have grown into a giant rebellious chorus!

Teresa has one Thanksgiving request to ask of you:

From: IndianaPatMom@comcast.net
Sent: Tuesday, November 21, 2006 11:31 AM
To: IndianaPatMom@comcast.net
Subject: Thanksgiving Request

Dear Friends,

While you're visiting friends and family Thursday, please sit everyone down at a computer and show them the online TeenScreen petition and have them sign it and forward it to everyone they know: http://www.petitiononline.com/TScreen/petition.html The only way to win this war is to inform enough people fast enough. Please do this as you are giving thank s for your freedom, your family, your friends but remember the children need us to stand up and protect their rights.

Please do this before you eat all the turkey and take a nap!

With much love,

Teresa Rhoades

Indiana Parents Against TeenScreen Mom

Indiana Politician on TeenScreen

Check out the video here. Just click on start to hear Eric Miller, the founder of Advance America, the largest pro-family organization in Indiana, talk about why we need to deep six TeenScreen.

Texas Hate-Crimer Was On Xanax

Texas teenager David Henry Tuck was sentenced to life in prison after an assault on a Hispanic teenager during which he sodomized the boy with an umbrella, yelling "White Power". The event occurred at a drug party where the main course included Xanax, a Prozac-style "anti-depression" drug.

Tuck has a history of this kind of behavior and was considered by the judge to be beyond rehabilitation. That's fine, but what about the Xanax? We've seen WAY too many violent crimes under the influence of this family of drugs to simply dismiss it. Would he have gone so crazy without the drug? His home town of Houston is where the mother drowned her four kids in a bathtub while she was on Prozac.

These drugs kill and should be outlawed.

Read the story at this link.

TeenScreen Hit Again

Enraged parents' groups around the country are continuing to explode in the face of the TeenScreen program. Seen as an attempt to hijack the school system as a feeder source for down-trending psychiatric funding and drug sales, TeenScreen is a sham program that asks a few questions of school children, then on the basis of these few answers pretends to predict whether these children are prone to suicide or exhibiting other signs of psychosis.

The answers to inane questions like, "Has there been a time when nothing was fun for you and you just weren't interested in anything?" and "Has there been a time when nothing was fun for you and you just weren't interested in anything?" children are being hung with psychiatric labels and encouraged or even coerced into taking drugs.

The latest shot across the bow is in Kenosha, Wisconsin. In an article in the Kenosha News (requires subscription) reporter Chris Barncard describes the outraged reaction of the Kenosha Parents Union which has "spoken out against school boundary changes and Columbia University TeenScreen, a suicide risk screening program being considered for Unified eighth-graders."

This is a reaction that is occuring across the United States, as TeenScreen continues to try to circumvent federal law that requires parental permission for children to participate in the program. TeenScreen spokesmen complain that requests for permission from parents have a low return rate, so they try to use "opt out" forms or give prizes to students who can bring back a signed form. But trickery like this only outrages parents' groups more. It's hard to tell Big Pharma and the psychiatry industry they have to go away, but they do. They have no place nosing around our children in the school system.

Looks Like TeenScreen's Out In Kenosha

In Kenosha, Wisconsin, the school board took a look at Teenscreen and isn't buying it. Citing the fact that it is funded by big pharmaceutical companies that benefit from the sharp increase of kids on psychiatric drugs. Another factor is the ridiculous idea that answering a few questions can tell you a kid is "suicidal". Especially since it identifies a large percentage of the people who answer the quiz as suicidal -- a much larger percentage than actually commit suicide or even try.

Read this story. It's "fair and balanced", quotes people who are in favor of the program, but points up the objections and concludes it's never going to happen.

Why Ritalin is a Scam

Now, how are you going to tell your kid not to take a class 2 drug from his friends when you are giving a class 2 drug made out of the same things to his kid sister? If you don’t make sense to your kids they’re not going to listen. Your kids have also checked out the web to see who is paying the school districts to put kids on drugs. In 1985 Congress passed the Individual Development Education Assistance Act (I.D.E.A.), giving funds in the billions to subsidize schools with kids who have learning disabilities.

Here’s the way it works: the US Government will give up to $450 and the state will give up to $160 to a school for each student who is labeled with a learning disability. Let’s do some math. At my old high school we had 2000 kids. The school figures about 10% have ADD, which is about 200 kids. You multiply 200 x $600 and that school gets over $120,000 per year for putting kids on drugs that are in the same FDA schedule classification as cocaine. Now how are you going to tell them not to take drugs?

-From an article by Steve Plog of the Results Project

Ritalin stunts growth of preschoolers; 40 percent develop side effects

A newstarget.com article cites a 70-week government study published in the November edition of the Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, which states that stunted growth and other side effects can follow treatment with Ritalin.

"The side effects reported on Ritalin's label include stomachaches, headaches and hallucinations, but reports have suggested it also causes more severe reactions such as liver problems and even death," says the article.

Children given the drugs grew about a half inch less than expected during the period of the study, and gained about 2 lbs. less than expected.

Another side effect? Aberrated behavior. "Some children even reacted with severe behaviors including hanging from ceiling fans and playing with fire," says the study.

How long before everyone realizes the emperor has no clothes?

Mental Health "200 to 300 years behind other branches of medicine"

A recent article in the NY Times illustrates the confusion in mental health. A Duke University professor of psychiatry says, "...the system of diagnosis is still 200 to 300 years behind other branches of medicine".

The article appears to be written by someone who is not really anti-psychiatry, but who is trying to make sense of the field. The result is journalistic anguish. One wants to take the writer by the shoulders, shake him and say, "Open your eyes! The field is completely destructive and insane!"

Psychiatry and psychology have been so ineffective for so long that people in the field have "adjusted" to it (to use their own term) and like the murderer who laughingly confesses to his crimes, they now freely admit their impotence, not realizing that such admissions are tantamount to a confession of guilt, in a field where innocence was lost long ago. If a family can find some combination of treatments that help a child improve, “then the diagnosis may not matter much at all," says one psychiatrist, apparently blind to the real implication of such a statement.

The article also exposes the lack of technology in the field, anecdotally relating the story of a family who tried to solve their child's so-called "mental problem" by going from psych to psych and getting different diagnoses and different treatments each time. Psychiatric terms like "ADHD" and "bipolar" are bandied about as if they meant something specific, but the article admits "Children can develop so fast that what looks like attention deficit disorder in the fall may look like anxiety or nothing at all in the summer."

Read the article at this link.

Psychsearch.net/Teenscreen

We've often recommended the Psychsearch.net site, but if you haven't been there recently, check it out again -- especially the Teenscreen page. It's hard to find another central repository of data that more exhaustively and accurately chronicles the ongoing fight against psychiatry as it tries to create a Big Brother atmosphere that is above the law.

In this world where a man can go to prison without committing a crime, and without a trial, ONLY because some "expert" can get a judge to agree that the man is insane, it is important to follow the progress of this fight and keep informed.

Read the quotes from newspapers in the right-hand column on the Teenscreen page.

Ritalin is Poison

"What’s wrong with the children? Basically the children have started to show signs of insanity because the system that is raising them is nuts," says Tom DeWeese. He then proceeds to surgically take apart the current system of diagnosing "ADHD" then prescribing drugs as a solution.

"Schools need answers. Parents need answers. Psychologists need to prove their credentials. So, in the dark, blind as bats, action has been taken." DeWeese discusses the origin of so-called "ADHD" and the way it came out of nowhere to create a multi-billion dollar industry for Big Pharma.

DeWeese says it like it is: "To date, there has never been issued a single peer-reviewed scientific paper officially claiming to prove ADD/ADHD exists. Nor has there ever been a single bit of physical evidence to confirm the disease exists. So-called experts on the subject have refused to answer the simple question, “is ADD/ADHD a real disease?” Medical researchers charge that ADHD does not meet the medical definition of a disease or syndrome or anything organic or biologic."

But delighted with the sales of Ritalin and other drugs, Big Pharma has been laying awake night trying to figure out ways to justify the existence of ADHD and pushing their poisons.

Read the entire article here.

Tell Them The Truth

This great article is from the L.A. Times. Read it in its entirety here. The Times requires a log-in but you can get one for free and it's easy to do.

Truth is, it's best if they know

Depression is less likely in children who are hip to what peers think of them -- good or bad.

By Melissa Healy, Times Staff Writer

Some politicians, public health officials, mental health activists and pharmaceutical companies have worked to establish mental-health screening programs in schools and the community. Those initiatives, including a model program designed at Columbia University called TeenScreen, aim to steer kids who are more likely to develop depression toward help before their emotional difficulties lead them to risky behaviors, academic failure or suicide attempts. In recent years, six states — Ohio, Florida, Pennsylvania, Nevada, Iowa and New Mexico — have moved to adopt programs that screen schoolchildren for warning signs of mental illness, including depression. Elsewhere, individual school districts have followed suit.

Those efforts have proven controversial. Many parents fear their children will be labeled as mentally ill and marked for special attention because they have expressed sentiments typical of adolescents. Others caution that there are few services and scant psychiatric help available for the millions of children that could be identified. And many suspect such screens are drug company-sponsored efforts to build the market for antidepressants.

Researchers and clinicians, meanwhile, say they are far from having developed accurate predictors of a child developing depression. The younger the child, the murkier the crystal ball.