Psychiatry Gone Wild: TeenScreen Exposed

A new article on TeenScreen has been issued by the folks at www.libertycoalition.net.

The goal of TeenScreen, the very controversial child screening program, is to do a mental suicide screening of every U.S. child before they graduate from high school. According to their website, they utilize screening instruments called the Diagnostic Predictive Scales (DPS) and the Columbia Health Screen (CHS).

Children as young as 9 years old are asked to answer the DPS or CHS questions. Afterwards, summary forms are then filled out by a clinician. TeenScreen's high false positive rate has many schools and parents alarmed that normal children will be labeled with mental disorders. For example the San Francisco Chronicle has just reported that "Local public schools have resisted TeenScreen. San Francisco Unified School District, for example, passed on TeenScreen because it can generate false positives and drain counseling resources. Other critics worry TeenScreen could send kids unnecessarily into treatment and land too many on psychiatric drugs."

Certainly pharmaceutical companies will benefit from mass screening of our children.

In the Liberty Coalition document you will find links to several important resources.

The documents are being made available for educational purposes, to advance understanding of the ramifications of mass mental screening as related to human rights, scientific, moral, ethical, and social justice issues. This material is distributed without profit.The Washington Post reported in an article entitled Suicide-Risk Tests for Teens Debated on June 16, 2006. "Shaffer said the screening test he developed is now in the public domain".

Shaffer, is the psychiatrist who created TeenScreen.

See What TeenScreen Wants For Our Kids

See what TeenScreen wants for our nation's kids.

7 foster children want you to listen to their story

VIDEO here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=al2UfX7kycM

TeenScreen Bites the Dust in Another Major School District

A friend of mine sent me the following information on TeenScreen activities:

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You can see the new TeenScreen Bites the Dust page here: http://www.teenscreen-locations.com/noteenscreen.htm

A spot has been reserved on that page for your State's TeenScreen schools.

According to the San Francisco Chronicle of today "Local public schools have resisted TeenScreen. San Francisco Unified School District, for example, passed on TeenScreen because it can generate false positives and drain counseling resources, said spokeswoman Gentle Blythe." You can see the full article here: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/01/22/SUICIDE.TMP

But according to the Chronicle article, private schools in San Fran are still experimenting on kids with TeenScreen. "About 30 percent of San Francisco private school teens tested so far were found to be at risk... about half of those were referred for treatment."

On another front in Kenosha, Wisconsin: NAMI, TeenScreen and Signs of Suicide, all with major ties to the pharmaceutical industry are attempting to overwhelm the local school district and convince them to throw common sense out the window.

Evidence of pharma ties to the below 3 organizations:

NAMI: http://www.psychsearch.net/nami.html,

TeenScreen http://www.teenscreentruth.com/teenscreen_key_players.html

Signs of Suicide http://www.signsofsuicide.org/

But the Kenosha Parent's Union is putting up a valiant fight. Please hook up with them and support them in any way possible: http://kenoshaparentsunion.org/index.php?option=com_joomlaboard&Itemid=27&func=view&id=2&catid=1

TeenScreen Is In Big Trouble

by Doyle Mills
January 15, 2007

The TeenScreen program is in big trouble.

TeenScreen is a highly controversial child suicide screening initiative with major ties to pharmaceutical companies. It is simply a marketing ploy to funnel massive numbers of our youth into the mental health system. An Internet search will pull up literally thousands of websites, articles and blogs critical of the program. Almost daily, newspapers publish articles and letters with the message that TeenScreen is a dangerous program, aimed at turning normal teenagers into new customers for the multi-billion dollar psycho-pharmaceutical industry. An on-line petition http://www.petitiononline.com/TScreen/petition.html with 16,000+ signatures, calls on state and federal legislators to "Stop TeenScreen's Unscientific and Experimental 'Mental Health Screening ' of American School Children ".

With public opinion against it, TeenScreen is on the defense. They are attempting to promote carefully crafted messages - over and over again. These "talking points" are seen every time a TeenScreen staffer is interviewed, and repeated in letters from TeenScreen's director, Leslie McGuire and local TeenScreen worker bees. With Rabin Strategic Partners, a high-dollar New York PR firm, at their disposal, such a coordinated strategy is of course expected. Yet, these talking points do not actually answer the hard questions posed by the program‘s critics. Instead they utilize a simple technique known as the “straw man argument”.

A straw man argument is a way of trying to win a debate while completely avoiding the actual subject at hand. It is done by taking a statement from one’s opponent and altering it so that it becomes ridiculous and thus easy to defeat. This is commonplace in politics. A candidate says “We need to be careful with our spending” and the other side sets up a straw man argument by saying: “My opponent wants to cut benefits to people who really need it.” It’s a dishonest way of trying to win the battle for public opinion. It’s a sign of desperation and an admission that one cannot confront the actual issues.

TeenScreen uses a handful of predictable statements to defend themselves. Unfortunately for TeenScreen, for Rabin, and for the pharmaceutical companies, these arguments are easily shot down by anyone who is willing to do a little research and who understands the straw man argument.

TeenScreen Straw Man Argument #1:

"We are not funded by drug companies!”, a statement found in practically every TeenScreen press release. Since TeenScreen refuses to divulge its funding sources, it’s impossible to know if this assertion is true. However, it is an example of the straw man argument. Nobody is claiming that TeenScreen is funded by drug companies. What is claimed, and can be verified, is that TeenScreen's advisory board is rife with major pharmaceutical company ties. Without belaboring the point, here is just a sampling:

• Robert Postlethwait, a TeenScreen advisory board member, spent 30 years at Eli Lilly until he retired in 1999. In 2004, according to a DarPharma Inc. press release, Postlethwait joined it's board of directors. DarPharma, Inc. is a company that develops "novel" psychotropic drugs.

• Catherine "Deeda" Blair, another TeenScreen advisory board member, has earned fees or stock from at least a half-dozen drug and biotech companies including Novartis, where she still consults, according a 2004 report by Fairchild Publications, Inc.

• In 2004 Michael Hogan, another TeenScreen advisory board member, won the Eli Lilly Lifetime Achievement Award.

You can find other TeenScreen advisory board members and their ties to pharmaceutical companies, courtesy of a website called www.TeenScreenTruth.com

Local TeenScreen operations can accept funds from drug companies or other groups that stand to make a profit from children identified as “mentally ill” by the screening process. One TeenScreen site, in Tennessee, accepted money directly from Eli Lilly, a major manufacturer of psychiatric drugs. TeenScreen’s defense is that they ”strongly recommend” that local groups do not receive drug company funding, so as to avoid the “appearance of a possible inducement to recommend treatment”. Note that they are concerned with the appearance of impropriety, not the truly dangerous situation of profit-oriented enterprises being given access to our young people.

Wherever TeenScreen pops up in various school districts, NAMI (the National Alliance on Mental Illness) can be found there pushing it. Invariably, NAMI helps spearhead the introduction of TeenScreen into schools. When local parents and civic groups speak out against the program, NAMI is TeenScreen’s most vocal defender. NAMI published a guide for its members with TeenScreen's straw man “talking points” in an attempt to counteract opposition to TeenScreen. NAMI has received millions of dollars in pharmaceutical company funding. (Note: Although TeenScreen is very secretive and will not release the names of the schools they have infiltrated, many can be found here http://www.teenscreen-locations.com/index.htm thanks to the enterprising work of a few parents who are scouring the country hunting them down.)

TeenScreen Straw Man Argument #2:

"We don't provide treatment!" It is true that TeenScreen is not directly in the treatment business. That fact is easily proven and that’s why this straw man argument is used. What opponents actually say is that many of those students screened will be referred to psychiatric treatment (drugs). TeenScreen’s own website makes it clear that treatment is integral to the screening process. The section entitled How to Start a Site includes this line: “Before you begin screening, a plan must be in place to manage the teens identified from the screening and ensure that they can access appropriate mental health services.”

Laurie Flynn, the Executive Director of TeenScreen, makes this point very clearly in an article she wrote, “The long-term goal of TeenScreen is not just identification, but treatment for those in need. The TeenScreen program is a five-step process ... In the final step, a case manager meets with teens and makes referrals for further evaluation and treatment.”

Treatment for those children identified by the TeenScreen program likely would include psychotropic drugging - which of course is a very profitable enterprise. Some of the drugs used to “treat” depression are known to cause suicidal ideation and induce violent behavior, and are required by the Food and Drug Administration to carry “black box” warnings stating this danger. TeenScreen itself admits that a percentage of the kids they screen and refer will wind up on drugs. Of course, they prefer to use the more benign-sounding term "medication". According to a study recently published in the Archives of General Psychiatry, kids who committed suicide were 15 times more likely to have been on antidepressants. This supposed suicide "prevention" program will likely increase teen suicides. Ironic indeed.

TeenScreen Straw Man Argument #3:

"We don't diagnose!" Certainly opponents of the program are not claiming that TeenScreen's 2-day-trained screeners diagnose anyone. That would be grounds for criminal action - practicing medicine without a license. Yet, the truth is that TeenScreen personnel are involved in the diagnosis. TeenScreen's "Screening Information Form" is filled out by screeners after the suicide survey is done on a child. The form contains check boxes for Social Phobia, Generalized Anxiety, Obsessive Compulsive, Depression and Panic Disorder. No, TeenScreen does not diagnose but they do set up the child for a diagnosis. As an analogy, they are not the bank robbers; they are the get away drivers - an accomplice to the diagnosis.

TeenScreen Straw Man Argument #4:

"We require written parental consent!" Bowing to public and media pressure, TeenScreen announced in August of 2006 that they would start requiring schools to obtain written parental consent before a child is screened which crippled the program's reach. TeenScreen’s previous public stance was to allow a surreptitious scheme known as “passive consent”. If the parent did not return a form specifically saying NO to screening - parental consent was assumed. In reality, many children were screened without their parents’ consent or knowledge. Though clearly unethical and illegal per federal law, this method drastically increased the number of children who could be screened. Some schools, apparently unaware of the national controversy, still use TeenScreen's passive consent method.

The brouhaha about active and passive consent misses the point made by TeenScreen’s opponents. In a letter to the editor published in The Fort Madison Daily Democrat, Jeannie Hetzer stated, “(the school) sends home a permission slip, but the permission slip gives the parent no idea of the content of the test or the repercussions.” In her article entitled “What TeenScreen Doesn’t Want You to Know about Parental Consent”, educator Mary Collins stated, “There are federal and state laws requiring ‘informed consent’, meaning that before someone agrees to participate in any medical procedure or experiment, they must be informed of and must understand the medical facts and the risks involved…NO TeenScreen sites use full informed consent.”

Certainly, TeenScreen DOES NOT provide full informed consent on what the ramifications of screening are and does not inform parents about the national controversy and the arguments against screening.

TeenScreen Straw Man Argument #5:

"It's the Scientologists who are against us!" Although Scientologists certainly should be flattered with that honorable distinction, many of the 700 plus doctors (to date) who have signed the "NO to TeenScreen petition" found here http://www.petitiononline.com/TScreen/petition.html may disagree with that straw man argument. The creator of the petition, Teresa Rhoades is a Baptist according to the Daily Oklahoman. She is suing in federal court because her child was screened and diagnosed without parental consent. Rhoades says: "What does religion have to do with it?" Christians and homeschoolers have been some of the staunchest critics of psychiatric screening in schools. Many state directors of The Eagle Forum, a family rights group, have worked on legislation against mental screening in schools. Jews, Catholics, Christians and Hare Krishna's are working against mental screening of kids in schools. Many and various religious, scientific, education, medical, anti-government intrusion, media and other groups are rebelling against TeenScreen's goal to screen every child before they graduate from high school. Parents from all walks of life, whose children have been harmed by psychotropic drugs, might also wish to be included in the opposition. Michael Hogan, director of the Ohio Mental Health Department and TeenScreen proponent, referred to those opposed to mass child mental screening as the “Curious Coalition”. Although TeenScreen proponents don't feel the need to announce their own religion when they are out campaigning to suicide screen, chances are they belong to the cult of biological psychiatry.

TeenScreen Straw Man Argument #6:

“Suicide is a leading cause of death in teens!" Opponents of TeenScreen don't argue that point. It can be verified by simply looking up the statistics on the internet. However, TeenScreen will not tell you the actual numbers for fear that no one will take them seriously. Suicide in young people is very, very rare. The word “suicide” tugs at the heart strings. Any suicide is certainly a tragedy and one suicide is one too many. TeenScreen's sales pitch on this point is effective in gaining sympathy from school administrators and parents who have not done their homework. If they elected to do their research on their own geographical area, they could find the low numbers from the Center for Disease Control website, which you can find here. http://webappa.cdc.gov/sasweb/ncipc/mortrate10_sy.html

The solution, if there could possibly be one for the rare cases, would certainly not be to screen every child in a school, especially when many will wind up on the same drugs that carry FDA mandated Black Box warnings that these drugs carry a significant risk of serious or even life-threatening adverse effects such as suicidal ideation!

TeenScreen’s claims that they are a "suicide risk screening program for youth” is a carefully worked out marketing scheme to gain support for their activity. The public at large cares about our next generation and would do anything to prevent suicide. What TeenScreen actually does is get more youth into the mental health system. They "partner" with local mental agencies and shrinks who become the recipients of the new customers and the profits. TeenScreen does not "partner" with non-psychiatric medical doctors to find a very possible physical source of a child's behavior, such as allergies, nutritional deficiencies, lack of exercise, toxicities and even side effects of psychiatric drugs!

TeenScreen is under attack, and rightly so. Our next generation is in danger and we cannot afford to let the future of this society be decided by straw man arguments. Demand that TeenScreen answer the tough questions and the real concerns. Then our lawmakers and school personnel can make the right decisions.

Wisconsin Psychologist Rips TeenScreen - After Receiving TeenScreen Training!

This letter was published by the Kenosha Parents Union. You can read it on their web site by clicking here.

Kenosha Parents Union is an organization of parents and community members working to Kenosha's strengthen public schools

Letter to Sheboygan Psychologist re TeenScreen

Sheboygan South High School
Attn. Dr. Fred Sutkiewicz
School Psychologist

Dear Fred,

Thank you again for meeting with my psychology interns and myself a few weeks ago. This meeting, combined with the TeenScreen training that I went through with you about a year ago has helped me better understand the overall program. Based upon everything I have learned about the program, I have serious concerns about the program and how it will negatively impact our community and youth.

As you are well aware by now, I am interested in the TeenScreen program due to the overwhelming power it has on the students, parents and our community at large. You personally are in a unique position, given the sheer number of students you come across and the many other individuals you will meet as a result of this program (e.g. parents, caregivers, community groups). I definitely see a need for extending help to those in need and having an active interest in students’ academic and emotional well being; however, the TeenScreen Program is not the best course of action for helping our young community. I hope you carefully review my concerns listed below, do a follow up review of the information I provided, and do your best to track any potential benefits and the negative consequences the program. I must also add that I was pleased to hear that you decided to break from the TeenScreen Manual protocol, which clearly endorses and uses language endorsing referrals to medical practitioners (e.g. psychotropic drugs), and use your best judgment with regards to providing appropriate referrals.

Due to the multiple other concerns regarding the program, I am forwarding this letter to the School Board for review as well. If, after reviewing the information below, you or the school Board would like to conduct a more point-by-point discussion about the program or choose not to continuing endorsing the program (e.g. as did several other school districts such as the Pinellas County School District in Pinellas, FL, Fresno Unified School District in Fresno, CA- where I did my graduate work and helped stop the TeenScreen Program from starting) I would be happy to meet with you to discuss creating a specific outreach program for our young community, one that may be more cost effective in the long run.

Since the field of psychology and psychiatry is unlike all other branches of health and medicine, (e.g. not adhering to the same rigorous objective standards for diagnosing and instead being quite subjective in nature, not having even one biological test for any psychiatric disorder, having poor agreement between mental health professionals not only for diagnosing, but also for the cause for all the disorders-often called “illnesses”, and having even poorer agreement from mental health professionals as to the best coarse of treatment), I was concerned to learn that our local schools began making psychiatric and psychological referrals based upon a subjective test that identifies 50% more students as at risk than highly trained clinicians do (e.g. per the TeenScreen training session that stated approximately 50% of the students sent to the clinician for an immediate follow-up mental health screening interview will not be found in need of an outside referral.) Given the subjective nature of the mental health field, it also should be concerning that of the 60% of the student body that takes the TeenScreen test, 16% of the interviewed students will be referred to an outside “practitioner” or agency. I know you stated that our community only had approximately 50% screened and that about 11% were referred to outside practitioners, but I have not heard back from you with regards as to where these children were sent to (e.g. psychiatrist or other medical doctor for drugs, family treatment or individual counseling).

Since I still have not heard where the children are being sent to, and since I inquired at the training numerous times about the referral process but was told you could not go into details about the guidance counselor training or referral process, it is clear the TeenScreen program does not want to discuss where they are sending these children. When I am asked to conduct a client-centered consultation and to make treatment referrals and/or recommendations, the clinical interview and data collected from this in-depth interview guides the treatment referrals and recommendations that I make. It appeared much more appropriate when I heard that the “interviewers” by the volunteer therapists were able to have some discussion and follow up questioning when a student was marked as having a “mental illness” or problem. Unfortunately, Teen Screen does not allow for the one who has all the information to make the referral, but rather the one individual who was trained by Teen Screen, who may not have any in depth psychological training.

Your referral process, debriefing discussion and verbal discussions with parents will ultimately direct their understanding of any potential problem, and will also ultimately direct their care (e.g. family therapist, individuals therapy, Priest, Minister, Rabi, psychiatrist, neurologist, pediatrician, etc...). Given this, I am sure you understand the significant and considerable difference between seeing a individual therapist specializing in child-adolescent therapy, obtaining skill-based education, and obtaining a average fifteen minute medical consult where by the data states that 90% of them will walk out with a prescription for a psychotropic drug.

The mental health field has continually been plagued with each specific treatment camp claiming to have the best type of treatment for a particular disorder. However, with recent meta-analysis studies coming out about the effectiveness of particular treatments, it has become even more confusing for researchers and practitioners alike to decide which treatment may serve a particular client best (Kirsch & Moore, 2002; Prevention and Treatment, Vol. 5, #23). Since the mental health field has not been consistent in determining a “best course of treatment”, nor has agreed that any approach is superior to one or another, I can only hope you personally decide not to follow other Teen Screen programs that predominantly and/or only states you will refer to physicians who in turn prescribes psychotropic drugs. I hope you will keep categorical referral records, and will allow researchers like myself access to this data to determine if the program actually has any benefit.

Regarding the letters that are sent to parents, I am also concerned that the three letters you handed out to us during the training session (e.g. one thanking the parent for the follow through on the TeenScreen recommendation, one stating the parent agreed to the screening but the child chose not to take the test, and a third stating the parent did not comply and seek treatment for their child which was against your and the TeenScreen recommendation) are not the only letters that could be sent to a parent or child protective agency. I still have not seen the other letters you were going to forward to us for review. Nevertheless, the last letter indicated above assumes that a parent did not seek a consultation after hearing that the TeenScreen check off list marked their child as potentially having a “mental illness” or problem; however, this letter does not account for the possibility that a parent sought out another opinion or even treatment but simply wants to protect their family privacy from the school system and government (i.e. they did seek counseling and simply did not tell the child’s school about it.) During the training session, you mentioned a certified letter that would be sent to parents if they did not respond to initial letters. Based upon the numerous attempts to get children screened and the numerous follow up letters available, it is clear the goal is to have the parent follow the TeenScreen referral recommendation. Again, this places the TeenScreen recommendation in a very influential and powerful position. To this extent, I really am interested in your “training program” for making these recommendations, and I request to see what the TeenScreen Manual recommends, especially since my son and daughter could be potential South High School TeenScreen statistic.

I am additionally concerned that during the training session you made reference to the support of the TeenScreen Program, but failed to mention anything about the drawbacks and limitations of the program and of the mental health professionals who admittedly oppose it. As a researcher, it is difficult to weight the pros and cons of a program when the program discussion only focuses upon how beneficial it might be, but yet fails to produce peer reviewed evidence demonstrating the benefits and failures of the program. Most importantly, there is no data to suggest that the TeenScreen Program actually lowers suicides. This program has been running for quite some time now, and I have not seen any peer reviewed data showing that the TeenScreen actually lowers suicide. Instead, TeenScreen’s own co-director, Rob Caruano, has acknowledged there is no proof or data available to demonstrate that the program reduces suicide rates (Dec. 22, 2004; South Bend Tribune-IN by D. Rumach, “TeenScreen assesses mental health of high school students.”) Additionally, the TeenScreen program was established in Tulsa, Oklahoma in 1997 . According to a 2003 Tulsa World newspaper article, Mike Brose, executive director of the Mental Health Association in Tulsa, stated: “To the best of my knowledge, this is the highest number of youth suicides we’ve ever had during the school year -- a number we find very frightening.” If the program is supposed to work, how can you explain this phenomenon?

Researchers and psychiatrists alike are even coming forth saying TeenScreen is unworkable. Nathaniel Lehrman, MD, former Clinical Director of Kingsbro Psychiatric Center in Brooklyn, NY, and Assistant Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at Albert Einstein & SUNY Downstate Colleges of Medicine, stated, “The claim by the director of Columbia University’s TeenScreen Program that her program would significantly reduce suicides is unsupported by the data. Indeed, such screenings would probably cause more harm than good. It is impossible, on cursory examination, or on the basis of the Program’s brief written screening test, to detect suicidality or “mental illness,” however we define it.” Dr. Lehrman and I discussed these issues in person in October 2005, and he was quite clear that even the process of screening for mental disorders can evoke or create psychiatric symptoms, thus leading to and possibly accounting for all the False Positives that the Teen Screen researchers acknowledge. He and I also agree that by having the screening device in the schools, with all the pressure to take the test from teachers, counselors, parents, etc..., it violates the privacy of those in whom these subjective “diseases” are sought.

Additionally, Dr. Marcia Angell, Harvard Medical School professor of Ethics and best selling author stated that the TeenScreen Program “is just a way to put more people on prescription drugs” and that such programs will boost the sales of antidepressants even after the FDA in September ordered black-box warning labels, warnings that stated that these drugs will not reduce, but rather create suicidal thoughts or behaviors in minors (The New York Post, December 5, 2004). As a result of the black-box warning labels that stated the SSRI antidepressants cause suicides and suicidal ideation, even in people who are not suicidal, sales instantly and sharply fell. Nonetheless, our school system has adopted a catch-all screening program that was created by previously paid drug company representatives and researchers (e.g. Laurie Flynn).

I am also concerned about the inference you made during the training session last year, an inference I pointed out during our meeting with the interns, whereby you stated the decrease in suicides over the past few decades was the result of the SSRI antidepressants. As you recall, you showed a graph demonstrating the reduction in suicides for our youth; however, you indicated that the decrease came as a result of the antidepressants drugs commonly called SSRI’s coming to the market. This is simply not true, as there is no data to support such an inference. Instead, the FDA and research has been quite clear: if you take an SSRI antidepressant drug, such as Prozac, Paxil, Luvox, or Effexor, you will be more likely to commit suicide and to have suicidal ideation, all things being considered.

Because the increase in suicide from taking SSRIs has been so clearly demonstrated, the Medicines and Health Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA), the equivalent to our FDA, in Great Britain recently banned all but one of the SSRI’s for anyone under the age of eighteen, noting that the one remaining SSRI drug, Prozac, although they could not be certain it caused people to commit suicide or become suicidal, “only worked in 1 of our 10 cases”. The drug companies are not able to find one study showing a reduction effect, but yet you allowed this inference to be made to all the counselor attendees at South High. I hope you are not continuing to make this inference, as it is unethical and inaccurate at best and quite dangerous and proven to be deadly at worst.

Likewise, there is no data proving that screening will prevent suicides, the whole reason this screening program came about to begin with. According to The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (May 2004):

A. “There is no evidence that screening for suicide risk reduces suicide attempts or mortality.” B. “There is limited evidence on the accuracy of screening tools to identify suicide risk.” C. “There is insufficient evidence that treatment of those at high risk reduces suicide attempts or mortality.” D. “No studies were found that directly address the harms of screening and treatment for suicide risk. “

I will address the reason the FDA and the TeenScreen program did not follow Great Britain’s actions later, but for now, I believe the SASD and you personally need to consider the following. If the Sheboygan Area School District (SASD) and its counselors who adopt the Teen Screen approach adopt a program that has a tendency or makes it customary to refer to “practitioners”, whereby the leading referral is to a medical doctor (knowing that approximately 90% of psychiatric referrals lead to a prescription- (Journal of the American Academy of Child Adolescent Psychiatry, 2002), and the SASD and their counselors have been made aware of the serious health problems associated with these antidepressant, stimulant and neuroleptic drugs, and finally if the SASD and its counselors know that the number of students referred could exceed the number of student actually in need of true mental health assistance (e.g. based upon the difference in the screening instrument and a clinician’s expertise), then the Sheboygan School District and its counselors could be found liable for the negative consequences that will ultimately result from this program.

I know of only one case in which someone was potentially liable and needed to pay for not medicating a child, but yet there are thousands and thousands of cases in which children are harmed by these drugs, doctors and school system referrals. I found no less than 4 specific cases recently going through the court system whereby a children or their parents sued their school district for the TeenScreen Program. This number does not include the dozens of cases that came up for teachers, counselors and school officials referring students to medical doctors for psychotropic drugs outside of the TeenScreen Program and settled outside of court, sealing all documents from the public eye.

Now that I have addressed several concerns, I would like to review how and why the program is being so quickly accepted across the United States despite the lack of evidence that it lowers suicides.

So where did Teen Screen come from? TeenScreen was developed by psychiatrist David Shaffer of Columbia University and New York State Psychiatric Institute’s Division of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry. Shaffer is a consultant for pharmaceutical companies that make psychotropic drugs (see page 21 of Executive Summary report, dated Jan. 21, 2004; American College of Neuropsychopharmacology, “Preliminary Report of the Task Force on SSRI’s and Suicidal Behavior in Youth.”) He has served as an expert witness for and on behalf of various drug companies, and he has been a paid consultant for specific psychotropic drugs. Some of his suicide surveys are made financially possible through an educational grant from Pfizer Inc., once receiving over $1,250,000 from just one of the drug companies (see American Foundation for Suicide Prevention press release, May 8, 2000.) In December of 2003, British drug regulators recommended against the use of SSRI antidepressants in the treatment of depressed children under 18 because some of the drugs had been linked to suicidal thoughts and self-harm. However, according to a Dec. 11, 2003, New York Times article, Shaffer, at the request of the maker of a psychotropic drug, attempted to block the British findings from being released, sending a letter to the British drug agency saying that there was insufficient data to restrict the use of the drugs in adolescents.

The director of the Teen Screen Program is Ms. Laurie Flynn. Ms. Flynn and the Teen Screen Program initially searched the newspapers throughout the US looking for reports of teens who had committed suicide. When they found such a tragedy, the program then sent a letter to the editors of the local newspaper telling them about how the Teen Screen Program could be a “solution” (Goode, E., British Warning on Anti-depressants Use for Youth, in New York Times, Dec. 11, 2003.) Like Shaffer, Flynn also had financial support from pharmaceutical companies that make psychotropic drugs. She served as the director of the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill (NAMI), which received no less than 11.7 million dollars from 18 different drug companies from 1996-1999, the largest being Eli Lilly, maker of Prozac. Ms. Flynn demonstrated her interest in trying to get children screened, calling for a “horse to ride” in order to gain access by an individual within or close to the school district board (see letter at http://www.psychsearch.net/Flynn_email.pdf).

Lastly, Ohio Mental Health Director, Michael Hogan, and California Director Stephen Mayberg are part of the Teen Screen Advisory Board. Hogan is also part of the New Freedom Commission on Mental Health, created by President Bush Sr.. The New Freedom Commission on Mental Health recommends the use of “state-of-the-art treatments” using “specific medications for specific conditions.” The Commission also praised the Texas Algorithm Project (TMAP) as a model medication treatment plan. This federal program endorsed the Teen Screen Program and called it a model program that should be used in all schools, daycares and agencies. The TMAP program, which sets the stage for the Teen Screen Program, is a set of guidelines for physicians to use when deciding what medication to give to a patient for a particular symptom or psychiatric problem. The program advocates the use of newer, more expensive antidepressants and antipsychotic drugs, but when Allen Jones, an employee of the Pennsylvania Office of Inspector General, revealed that key officials with influence over the medication plan in his particular state received money and perqs from the drug companies to have the more expensive drugs listed higher on the TMAP type program, he was fired for talking to the New York Times. Pharmaceutical giant Janssen took the lead in exerting influence over state officials by creating “advisory boards” made up of state mental health directors who were regularly treated to all expense paid trips and conferences. By influencing 50 key officials, the company knew that it would have a good shot at getting a TMAP list adopted in every state. For example, Ohio Mental Health Director Hogan and California Director Mayberg, are New Freedom Commission members who control mental health services in their respective states, and both are also members of a Janssen advisory board. Hogan has proven to be so useful that Eli Lilly gave him a Lifetime Achievement Award. In granting the award it was noted that Hogan had given over 75 paid presentations at conferences since he accepted the position on Bush’s New Freedom Commission. In every keynote speaker engagement that Hogan has performed at, he has been paid by a pharmaceutical company and the conference has been sponsored by a drug company. Interestingly, Bush Sr., who developed the Freedom Commission on Mental Health, endorsing TMAP and TeenScreen, was also on Eli Lilly’s Board of Directors for many years, holds heavy stock in pharmaceutical companies, and obtains huge donations from such companies.

More specifically to Teen Screen, their Funding was said to be given by private donations; however, TeenScreen and Columbia University refused to divulge the source of their funding. Their website says they are funded by private family foundations, corporations and individuals, without naming them. One corner of their Internet site did give a clue to their funding: “A large pharmaceutical company funded the TeenScreen program in Tennessee (http://www.psychsearch.net/teenscreen.html, see page 4, left, mid-page). In Florida, Jim McDonough, the director of the Florida Office of Drug Control, was sent an email from Flynn threatening to pull funding if more children were not screened in their community (e.g. March 22, 2004, “We’ve been working with David Shern and USF for 18 months or so and still haven’t got a program going....At this point I’m inclined to re-think the use of our resources. We’re sending about $120k to USF annually. . . . but ultimately we’re not achieving our goals in the community,” Flynn wrote.) Flynn later stated to McDonough that she had to find kids to screen and said, “I’m looking for a horse to ride here!” According to Flynn’s testimony in March 2002, she hopes to screen no less than 7-12 million new potential drug company customers.

I pose the question, aren’t eight million kids on Ritalin enough?

I hope this raises your suspicion as to the “true” agenda to the Teen Screen Program, and has demonstrated sufficiently how the program fails to produce desirable results. The Teen Screen Program is about making profits, not about helping children. To this extent, I present some basic profit calculations. According to the Teen Screen 10 year strategy, TeenScreen wants to make the suicide survey available to all American children.

Since 1991, the Columbia University Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry has invested nearly $19 million in the “research” and development of the Columbia TeenScreen program. I ask who will reap the returns?

There are 47.7 million (47,700,000) public school students.
There are 5 million (5,000,000) private school students.

17% of the kids screened by TeenScreen accept counseling (8,959,000). Seventeen percent (17%) may be a low percentage, but I am only taking numbers supplied by TeenScreen.

According to TeenScreen, 9.9% of the kids screened are drugged (5,217,300). TeenScreen says less than ten percent (10%) are prescribed some type of drug. This means that a whopping 60% of kids who accept referral counseling as a result of the suicide survey wind up on drugs. Keep in mind these are TeenScreen’s own numbers; actual figures may be much higher.

One example prescription for a common psychotropic drug is $15.56 per day.
5,217,300 students (customers) x $15.56 per day = $81,181,188 per day.
$81,181,188 x 365 days a year = $29,631,133,620 annually.

That’s nearly 30 billion dollars per year in pharmaceutical sales courtesy of the TeenScreen program.

Multiply that by a lifetime of addiction due to down or up regulation of neuroprocessing, and it is no wonder why drug companies are tripping over themselves to sponsor screening of everyone in the United States (e.g. It is mandated that every pregnant woman and child, infant to 18 years old, be mentally screened by every pediatrician, school and day care every year. That is three screenings per year, every year!). In one Colorado study over 350 youths were suicide screened using TeenScreen’s survey. They found that over 50% were at risk of suicide and 71% screened positive for psychiatric disorders at a youth homeless shelter. That’s not science, that’s a dream come true for drug companies.

Having presented all this, I would be happy to work with the SASD if they are interested in creating a specific program to address emotional well being in our children. I think it is noteworthy to acknowledge that just recently yet another study comparing cognitive psychotherapy to antidepressant medication (Paxil) was just published in the Archives of General Psychiatry. The research was done at the University of Pennsylvania and Vanderbilt University using 240 patients. It was funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and confirmed that the use of psychotherapy intervention worked at least as well as the SSRI, even with moderately to severely depressed patients (i.e. keeping in mind that up to 90% of the medication effect can be explained by placebo effect-sugar pill; Antonuccio, D., Antidepressants: A Triumph of Marketing Over Science?, In Prevention & Treatment, Volume 5, Article 25, posted July 15, 2002.) The study went on to report that if the patients stopped taking the psychiatric drug, they were twice as likely to develop a relapse of depression. The researchers called for the American Psychiatric Association (APA) to revise their treatment guidelines to discourage the use of drugs for depressed individuals.

I would respectfully request that the following data and information be given to all parents prior to any screening, as I believe the real issue here is parental rights related to what they deem appropriate for their children. I do not believe the government should interfere and have any legitimate authority to direct a families intimate health matters. I believe there is a right to know about hidden agendas and what could occur if they disagree with the recommendations of the School Counselor. I also ask that the SASD offer an opinion regarding if they are willing to report parents to the Department of Family Services if the parents choose not to medicate their children or agree with the screening device that states their child has a mental disease (i.e. as in the cases of Matthew Smith and Shaina Dunkle who died of medication toxicity after their parents were coerced into placing their children on drugs by their school.) Other examples include the nightmare that Aliah Gleason went through when she was taken from her home, not allowed parental contact for five months while she was placed in foster care, and ultimately forced to take drugs due to the incorrect screening outcomes and misinformed school district. These are tough questions that have not been answered as of yet, and I believe they need to be addressed before child is torn between a well-intentioned school district, school counselor, profit driven program and parent.

Kindest Regards,

Dr. Toby Watson, Psy.D.
Clinical Depth Psychologist
Clinical and Doctoral Training Director
International Center for the Study of Psychiatry and Psychology Board Member

Do Legalized Drug Pushers Influence TeenScreen?

This article from the American Chronicle. Read the original by clicking here.

Raise your hand if you think that a drug company’s main purpose is to help mankind? In a perfect world that would be the case, but instead, welcome to Planet Earth. The Board of Directors of any drug company has but one obligation to their stockholders – to provide a good return on their investment by increasing revenue and profits.

Since the 1980’s, the drug industry has been one of the most profitable industries in the world, on par with oil and banking industries. IMS Health, a company that heralds themselves as “the one global source for pharmaceutical intelligence”, stated that in 2005, North American pharmaceutical sales were at $265.7 billion.

Drug companies hammer us with the propaganda on how much money is spent on research, and that out of the millions spent on research, few drugs make money. One could easily be led down this path of deception but careful research shows that the real drug company spending is not research, but marketing.

The top ten pharmaceutical companies invest about 14% of their profits in R&D (Research and Development). However, about 35% is spent on marketing. For every $1.00 spent on research, $2.50 is spent promoting the drugs to the public. These billions of dollars in marketing include drug promotions during nearly every television commercial break, handing out free samples and propaganda to family doctors, sponsoring lavish medical conferences at expensive resorts, and “research grants”.

Millions are also spent on helping to create and support various front groups like NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness) and CHADD (Children and Adults with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder) which forward the drug company’s marketing message covertly. Millions more are spent in lobbying Congress to protect drug company profits. The U.S. government is the largest bulk buyer of drugs, after Wal-Mart, but the "Social Security Prescription Drug Benefit Program" forbids the government from negotiating drug prices with Big Pharma!

A typical “breakthrough” in drug research is merely a drug company in partnership with a university announcing and marketing their own version of a previously released drug for the same disorder. The FDA will approve the new drugs, when provided with short-term studies where the drug companies purportedly show that the drug performs better than a placebo. In 2002, the FDA approved the use of seventy-eight new drugs but only classified seven of these drugs as improvements over older drugs.

Drug company money is funneled into all kinds of research. For instance, the doctors who created "Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder" (PMDD) were funded in part by Eli Lilly Corporation. By “proving” their drug Prozac treats a new “disease”, Lilly was able to extend the patent on the drug for seven more years. Now the exact same drug is marketed under a new name, "Sarafem", to treat women with PMDD. Their slogan became, “Think it’s PMS? It could be PMDD.” Think it's a marketing ploy? You bet it is! Patented drugs are sold at drastically higher prices than non-patented drugs.

Another marketing ploy used is to advertise the name of the drug without stating its use. This allows the company to avoid mentioning the huge list of side effects.

Big Pharma doesn’t stop there. They are now busy making huge donations to pseudo-scientific and official-sounding mental health organizations and screening programs to push even more customers onto their drugs.

“Signs of Suicide” is a program developed by the non-profit group “Screening for Mental Health, Inc.” Tax records show that donations from 2001-2004 included money from Solvay Pharmaceuticals: $27,500, Pfizer: $750,000, Abbott Laboratories: $35,000, Forest Labs: $153,000, Wyeth Pharmaceuticals: $100,000, and Eli Lilly: $2,157,925. Why would drug companies donate millions to implement mental health screening if not to increase revenue and profits?

TeenScreen, an invention of psychiatrist David Shaffer, is a screening program which uses questionnaires on children as young as nine, asking questions like, "Have you often felt very nervous when you’ve had to do things in front of people?" and "Are you Hispanic or Latino?" Based on their answers, TeenScreen routes these kids to mental health “professionals", who inevitably decide that these children have symptoms defined as “mental disorders”, justifying prescriptions for antidepressants and other psychotropic drugs for many of these children. TeenScreen’s staff and advisory board are loaded with ties to Big Pharma. See: http://www.teenscreentruth.com/teenscreen_advisory_board.htm

TeenScreen’s Director, Laurie Flynn was formerly the head of NAMI National. Between 1996 and mid 1999, NAMI received over 11 million dollars from the drug companies: Janssen ($2.08 million), Novartis ($1.87 million), Pfizer ($1.3 million), Abbott Laboratories ($1.24 million), Wyeth-Ayerst Pharmaceuticals ($658,000), Bristol-Myers Squibb ($613,505) and Eli Lilly $2.87 million.

The scandals of TeenScreen are not limited to drug company connections. Laurie Flynn also perjured herself in front of a Senate Subcommittee, stating that TeenScreen had partnered with the University of South Florida and were piloting the program in Hillsborough and Pinellas counties. Yet there were never any pilot programs in these two counties. In fact, the school board of Pinellas County soundly rejected TeenScreen, partially because of Flynn’s false testimony. One school board member was quoted as saying, “I will not do business with an organization that has gone to Congress and told them something that is not true.”

In 2003, drug regulators in the United Kingdom recommended that antidepressants not be used to treat children under eighteen years of age, because of studies showing that the risks greatly outweighed any possible benefit. This is now law and included in their drug warnings. However, at the request of Pfizer, TeenScreen’s David Shaffer created a letter which attempted to block the findings of the U.K. drug regulators.

The results of pushing these dangerous drugs on children and adults include: murder, psychosis, brain damage, liver and heart damage, suicidal thoughts, attempted suicides and actual suicide – all known side effects of psychiatric drugs. How many children and young adults have to be permanently damaged or killed before we just say "NO!" to these legal drugs and to TeenScreen? Now ask yourself, "Who are the criminals?"

Everyone knows that drugs are big business, and the only difference between street dealers, drug lords and Big Pharma is that Big Pharma is legal. Whether your child is hooked by a dealer or by a psychiatrist, the end result will be the same.

For the time being, the psychiatric drug trade is legal. As long as this is the case, drug companies have a legal right to market their wares and make a profit. They do not have a right to slither into schools in order to find new profit centers amongst our children. The public has a right to know the truth about these criminal activities and we all have a responsibility to protect our next generation from unwanted intrusions into their lives for profit.

Special Note: Thousands of concerned citizens have already recognized who the criminals are and have taken decisive action to stop their intrusion into the lives of young people. Join them by clicking on this link: http://www.petitiononline.com/TScreen/petition.html

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John Carey has degrees in Chemical Engineering and Computer Science from Texas A&M, and has worked for a major oil company for over 20 years. As a humanitarian endeavor, he has researched extensively on the psychiatric drugging of children. He can be reached here: john_carey_2-45@hotmail.com

This very sad story is an illustration of the basic theme that originally inspired this blog: That the whole world has it backwards. This lady did her worst AFTER she was institutionalized six times. If psychiatry really helps anyone, how come they always go crazy AFTER they get their "help"? And you know she was drowned in psychiatric drugs if she was institutionalized. That's what they do -- they drug people. That is their solution. But for some reason everyone has it backwards and this lady is let off because she was "insane". I actually don't have as much attention on the fact they didn't throw the book at her -- it's true she was insane. What I have a problem with is the fact that everyone looks the other way regarding the cretins that put her in this condition, the sickies that run the psych institutions and dispense drugs that make people suicidal and homicidal, and call them "antidepressants". They should be called "depressants".

From CNN:

SAN FRANCISCO, California (AP) -- A woman who pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity after throwing her three children into San Francisco Bay was acquitted Tuesday of first-degree murder but convicted of assault.

The jury continued deliberating the possibility of convicting LaShuan Harris, 24, of second-degree murder or manslaughter. Jurors must also decide whether Harris was legally sane when she killed her children.

The assault charges carry a maximum penalty of life in prison.

Harris has been accused of killing 6-year-old Trayshawn Harris, 2-year-old Taronta Greely Jr. and 16-month-old Joshua Greely. She threw the boys into the chilly bay October 19, 2005. Prosecutors have said they won't seek the death penalty.

In her videotaped confession, Harris described how she struggled with two of her boys as she stripped them and plunged them from Pier 7, where tourists stroll along the waterfront. Her youngest boy laughed, thinking it was a game.

One of the bodies was recovered, but the others were never found.

Her lawyer said Harris had schizophrenia, was borderline mentally retarded and was convinced she was sending her children to heaven.

But prosecutors said Harris claimed God told her to make a human sacrifice. And because she chose to kill her children instead of herself, she should be found guilty of murder, they said.

Prosecutor Linda Allen said jurors would probably feel sorry for Harris but urged them to use their heads, not their hearts.

"I don't expect you to have a cold heart, but to have a rational mind," Allen said.

According to her lawyer, Harris was placed in a psychiatric hospital six times between February 2004 and August 2005, and her mother warned a social worker that she would hurt her children. But the social worker didn't believe her, Caffese said.

British Psychiatrist Slams TeenScreen

Excerpted from Interview of Joanna Moncrieff, MD
Interviewer: Claudia Hammond
January 3, 2007
Audio can be found here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vBfA2OBirBI

“All in the Mind” reports from the U.S.A. on the increasing controversial mental health screening programs for school children. Now, here’s Claudia Hammond with “All in the Mind”

Claudia Hammond: The biggest screening program is TeenScreen; it’s a quick questionnaire designed for 9-18 year olds. And the idea is to highlight anyone who might have symptoms of a psychiatric problem.

But not everyone is happy with the idea. Everyday teenage behaviour might be pathologized as illness and that the more children who are screened the more children will end up on psychiatric medication. And some parents are unhappy that their children were given the test at all.

Claudia Hammond: Joanna, in Chelsea’s case, the issue of consent did seem to be a big problem. But if in principal, if parental consent is obtained and it’s all voluntary, I mean it sounds like a kind of laudable aim to try and screen individuals.

Joanna Moncrieff: Well firstly on the issue of consent, in order for it to be informed consent, parents really ought to be told that there is no evidence that screening is actually going to prevent suicide, which is one of the main reasons it was introduced and also that the evidence about standard psychiatric treatment; such as drug treatments in children is questionable.

For example the trials on the use of antidepressants in children are inconsistent and many of them show that antidepressants do not have good effects in children. So parental consent needs to be properly informed consent. And I’m not at all convinced that the parents are getting the full facts when they’re being asked about whether to submit their children to this screening program.

I think problem with screening is it, it’s already suggesting way before you get into a clinical interview that it’s already starting to reframe peoples’ problems in medical terms and so even if the people who do this screening test don’t actually say explicitly to the children that they’ve got a psychiatric disorder called “this”. The children will take away from the experience of screening that they have a psychiatric problem and that they’re psychiatrically ill and in today’s’ climate many people will assume that that means that they need drug treatment. One test of the screening instrument that happened in Colorado diagnosed 50% of children as having evidence of possibly having some psychiatric disorder.

Claudia Hammond: 50%? That really is quite high isn’t it?

Joanna Moncrieff: It is indeed. And although not all of those people would probably have a confirmed diagnoses after a clinical interview, you’ve already started to suggest to them and their families that there’s something’s wrong and that what is wrong is a medical or psychiatric problem.

Claudia Hammond: So Joanna, if it’s all voluntary like that and it’s framed in such a way that the children themselves and their parents know exactly what it is they’re filling in and what this test can do and can’t do; isn’t that sort of reasonable to sort of highlight things if you can do it in a very sensitive way?

Joanna Moncrieff: Well first of all, as you know it hasn’t always been done in a voluntary way; often the screening has been implemented when parents haven’t objected to it rather then actually parents actively agreeing to their children to be screened. But secondly I think although many children will attend a clinical interview and won’t necessarily go on to be diagnosed and put on drug treatment. Actually even the experience of going to see a psychiatrist may be very frightening and very stigmatizing for some people, especially some young people. I think as psychiatrists we get immune to that and loose sight of how perturbing it is to be told that even might have a psychiatric problem. And of course some children will end up on drug treatment and we know that more and more children are being put on drug treatment. And I think that there is not enough concern about that at the moment.

Claudia Hammond: Joanna , what do you think will happen here? Will we see this coming across the Atlantic and being introduced in schools in the U.K. do you think?

Joanna Moncrieff: I don’t know whether we’ll actually get the full screening, with use of screening instruments. But we already see evidence in the U.K. of the sort of attitudes that inspired screening in the U.S.

For example, many more childhood behavioural problems are being labelled as psychiatric disorders, are being given diagnostic labels and the use of a range of psychiatric drugs such as Ritalin and stimulants, antidepressants and antipsychotics; their uses all increasing in line with trends in the United States albeit not as dramatically.

Claudia Hammond: If screening programs do start to appear over here we’ll keep you up to date on “All in the Mind” But in the meantime do let us know what you think about the idea of screening teenagers in schools. You can email us at allinthemind@bbc.co.uk

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Joanna is a Senior Lecturer in Psychiatry at University College London, department of Psychiatry and Behavioural Science. She has published several critical reviews of psychiatric drug treatments, as well as papers on the history of psychiatry. She is the founding member and co chair person of the Critical Psychiatry Network (web site: www.critpsynet.freeuk.com). This is a network of psychiatrists in the UK who challenge some of the orthodox thinking in psychiatry, especially the emphasis on the medical model of psychiatric disorder, and the link between psychiatry and coercion.

NY Times: Lilly Settles For 500 Million

This article is from the New York Times. I understand that "Zyprexa" is Prozac repackaged. It is an end run around the expiration of the Prozac patent. By making minor changes, Lilly was able to start up a new patent, thus getting richer by selling a drug that couldn't be copied. But bad drugs are bad drugs. Already discredited for its effect as "Prozac", it is still causing trouble in its new incarnation.

Lilly to Pay Up to $500 Million to Settle Claims


By ALEX BERENSON
Published: January 4, 2007
Eli Lilly agreed today to pay up to $500 million to settle 18,000 lawsuits from people who claimed they developed diabetes or other diseases after taking Zyprexa, Lilly’s drug for schizophrenia and bipolar disorder

Including earlier settlements over Zyprexa, Lilly has now agreed to pay at least $1.2 billion to 28,500 people who claim they were injured by the drug. At least 1,200 suits are still pending, the company said. About 20 million people worldwide have taken Zyprexa since its introduction in 1996.

The settlement covers cases filed in state and federal courts by 14 plaintiffs’ law firms or groups of firms, Lilly said. The federal suits have been overseen by a judge in Brooklyn, Jack B. Weinstein of the Eastern District of New York.

The settlement will not affect civil or criminal investigations pending over Zyprexa from state attorneys general and federal prosecutors, which are continuing.

Both Lilly and lawyers for plaintiffs said they were pleased with the agreement. With sales of $4.2 billion last year, Zyprexa is Lilly’s largest-selling drug and a major contributor to the company’s profits. Lilly shares were little changed after the settlement announcement.

Zyprexa is the brand name for olanzapine, a potent chemical that binds to receptors in the brain to reduce psychotic hallucinations and delusions. Clinical trials show Zyprexa also causes severe weight gain and increases in cholesterol and blood sugar in many patients.

Documents provided to The New York Times last month by a lawyer who represents mentally ill patients show that Lilly played down the risks of Zyprexa to doctors as the drug’s sales soared after its introduction in 1996. The internal documents show that Lilly’s own clinical trials found that 16 percent of people taking Zyprexa gained more than 66 pounds after a year on the drug, a far higher figure than the company disclosed to doctors.

The documents also show that Lilly marketed the drug as appropriate for patients who do not meet accepted diagnoses of schizophrenia or bipolar disorder, Zyprexa’s only approved uses. By law, drugmakers may only promote their drugs for diseases in which the Food and Drug Administration has found the medicines to be safe and effective, although doctors may prescribe drugs in any way they see fit.

In response to questions about the information in the documents, Lilly has denied any wrongdoing and said it provided all relevant information to doctors and the F.D.A. Lilly has also said it did not promote Zyprexa for conditions other than schizophrenia or bipolar disorder.

In 2004, a panel of the American Diabetes Association found that Zyprexa caused diabetes more than other widely used antipsychotic drugs in part because it tends to cause much more weight gain. But the F.D.A. has never made a similar finding. Instead, the F.D.A. added a warning in 2003 to the label of Zyprexa and other new antipsychotic drugs about their tendency to cause high blood sugar.

The settlement follows an additional $700 million agreement in 2005 covering 8,000 patients, as well as 2,500 individual settlements whose total value has not been disclosed, Lilly said. The 2005 settlement valued each claim at nearly $90,000 per plaintiff, while today’s agreement values claims at more than $27,000 per plaintiff.

The lower value for the new claims comes in part because of the F.D.A. label change, which has allowed Lilly to contend that it adequately warned doctors of Zyprexa’s risks after 2003. The label change may also help to protect Lilly from other lawsuits going forward, drug industry analysts and lawyers say.

In its statement, Lilly said the settlement did not change its views that Zyprexa is a safe and effective treatment for mental illness.

"We wanted to reduce significant uncertainties involved in litigating such complex cases," Sidney Taurel, Lilly’s chief executive, said in the statement.

Richard Meadow, one of the lead lawyers for plaintiffs, said the deal was fair to both sides. "Prolonging this litigation further is in no one’s best interest," he said.

Letter To The Editor In The San Francisco Chronicle

I want to thank you for your Dec. 27 article, "Illiteracy reinforces prisoners' captivity" which provides interesting statistics on the enormous number of prisoners who are poorly educated or illiterate.

The illiterate person is cut off from being able to communicate with or understand the rest of society that he depends on. Too many find crime as their only solution. If we could just get our schools to educate children, we will have fewer people turn to crime and then fewer people in prison, instead of more and more.

My plea is not for money. I am begging parents and school officials to reject the insidious idea that schools are supposed to be mental-health clinics and return to real teaching methods that produce real results: Children who can read, write, do math, and have knowledge of history to make informed political decisions, and sciences to have vocational choices.

A Brit Doubts The Existence Of ADHD

Here's an interesting rant by a Brit who doesn't buy the ADHD fraud. It's from the Sunday Mirror newspaper.

NAUGHTY KIDS NEED DISCIPLINE NOT DRUGS

Paul Routledge

I seem to have stirred up a hornet's nest by doubting the existence of so-called Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).

One reader, who claims two children with ADHD, accuses me of "hurtful, unhelpful comments".

Another points out that children today sorely lack discipline.

And I hear from South Wales of a family whose "very modest" demand is for a three bedroom council house because one of their two sons might have the disorder. This is obviously a very divisive issue. It is also a hidden scandal.

Let's look at the facts. ADHD was first described by a Dr Friedrich Hoffman in 1845, in his book of poems about "Fidgety Philip". The symptoms were inattention, fidgeting, restlessness - and noisily tapping pencils.

This sounds like most children in my experience. They can't sit still, and their attention span is shorter than a politician's.

Over a century later, doctors in the US - who get paid in proportion to the treatment they say is necessary - realised this syndrome is a goldmine. ADHD was unknown in my childhood, but like so many Yankee ideas it soon crossed the Atlantic. And if we are to believe the medical profession, there are now 366,000 sufferers under the age of 18 in the UK.

Official figures from the Department of Health show that more than 1,000 prescriptions for powerful drugs are doled out every day to treat behavioural disorders in children. GPs prescribed drugs such as Ritalin, known as the "chemical cosh", on 384,000 occasions last year - a fourfold increase since 1997. An estimated 32,000 children are being drugged every day, at a cost to the NHS of £13.5million a year.

A whole generation is in danger of becoming drug-dependent because parents and doctors want to "medicalise" bad behaviour, rather than control it through diet, discipline and parental devotion. Consultant child psychiatrist Dr Sami Timimi argues that medicalisation of childhood problems is due to a search for "an easy cure that fits in with our fast lifestyles and gives us a quick answer".

Real-life TV programmes also glorify misbehaved children, and pander to the hand-wringing inadequacy of parents. Stroppy Johnny makes good telly, but it also encourages imitative behaviour.

So far, so bad. But I also learn that drug companies secretly fund support groups for parents of kids diagnosed with behavioural problems. In other words, they are fuelling this Ritalin bonanza - despite evidence linking their very profitable drugs to sudden deaths and heart problems.

Even Health minister Andy Burnham accepts that there is "limited information" about the long-term effects of these drugs.

I am not a doctor, and do not pretend to medical knowledge. But my sense of smell is unimpaired, and this business stinks.

Is TeenScreen Controversial?

You be the judge.

See video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RfU9puZQKBY&eurl= (Watch full screen so you don't miss the actual "motivational poster" of a TeenScreen employee who advocates "Drugging America's Children -- One Child At A Time".

Do you want to help?

To augment the national controversy, pick a school in your neck of the woods and raise the dickens with school board members, legislators, newspapers, radio and your local TV news. Any talk radio show, for example, would be interested in what you have to say about the national controversy of the secretive TeenScreen which will not release their financial records (what are they hiding?) and refuse to make their suicide survey public.

Any radio show will go "Huh, what, really??? We can do a show on that!" when you tell them them that school children as young as 9 years old are being asked questions about suicide and then are being referred to dangerous and controversial "treatment" (psychiatric drugs).

Drug Company Lies

Here's a great article from the Austin American-Statesman:

And, for additional information concerning Drug Company illegal acts, lawsuits and funding of Psychiatric Programs, go to www.winhs.org for routine updates.

Leading Pharmaceutical Company, Johnson and Johnson and Several Subsidiaries Misrepresented the Safety and Effectiveness of Anti-Psychotic Drug (Risperdal) – Then Influenced State Officials into Making the Suspect Drug a Standard Treatment in Public Mental Programs.

By Jason Embry, W. Gardner Selby
December 16, 2006

Texas Attorney General, Greg Abbott joined the suit and alleges official State's mental facilities were duped into using the drug. A lawsuit against the pharmaceutical company claims State official pushed the drug and was rewarded with money.

Attorney General Greg Abbott joined the lawsuit filed in Travis County district court by Allen Jones, a former investigator for the state of Pennsylvania, against Johnson & Johnson Inc. and five related companies. Jones says in the lawsuit that he learned of payments to at least one Texas mental health official in interviews he conducted as an investigator. No official is named in the lawsuit.

The lawsuit, which came to light Friday, seeks to recover for the state untallied alleged overcharges to the state's Medicaid program, which pays for health care for low-income people.

Jones' lawsuit alleges that the companies launched a drug named Risperdal in 1994 to treat schizophrenia. About the same time, the state was developing a protocol, or treatment guidelines, for which drugs should be used in public mental health programs. The defendants "provided substantial financial contributions to and improperly influenced the development" of the protocols, the lawsuit said, and Risperdal took precedence in the protocols over cheaper, equally effective medicines.

The drug later received recommendations as the medicine of choice in the state's mental health protocol for treating children and adolescents, even though it lacked a Food and Drug Administration indication for those age groups, the lawsuit says. It says side effects and health risks include increased chance of stroke, renal failure and hyperglycemia.

The companies pushed Risperdal in other states through paid consultants on expert panels, peer-to-peer marketing strategies and "administrative decisions made by a select few public officials," the lawsuit says. The companies sent an unnamed Texas official around the country as a spokesman for the drug, and they hired third-party contractors to conceal their control and funding of medical education programs, speakers' bureaus and clinical research that promoted the benefits and safety of Risperdal, the lawsuit says.

The lawsuit says at least 17 states, including Texas, have implemented the protocol or are doing so.

"We allege it's a scheme whereby they passed off as medical science phony representations and misleading facts about the efficacy and appropriateness of these drugs," said Thomas Melsheimer, a lawyer for Jones.

Abbott's office declined to comment on the lawsuit, as did spokesmen for Johnson & Johnson and the state's Health and Human Services Commission, which oversees the Medicaid program. A commission spokesman did say Texas paid 308,000 claims totaling $73.5 million for Risperdal in 2005.

Melsheimer described Jones as a "classic whistle-blower" who filed the lawsuit in 2004 on behalf of Texas to recover the companies' overcharges. Because of his whistle-blower status, the lawsuit was sealed from public view until Abbott joined it.

Copyright 2001 – 2006 Cox Texas Newspapers, LLC. All Rights Reserved

Ouch! Burned my fingers on this one...

This is a letter to the editor from a mother in Fort Madison, Iowa. It is apparently an answer to an attack on a previous letter she wrote, but the content of this letter is self-explanatory.

It is from the Opinion section of the Fort Madison Daily Democrat newspaper.

Fort Madison Daily, Iowa

December 19, 2006

Mission accomplished - My objective was to make parents think twice about TeenScreen

I wrote the original letter about the Teen Screen test being given in the schools. Ms. Gutman and Ms. Jarvis said "much of the letter was inaccurate and seemingly misinformed." I'm wondering what was inaccurate or misinformed.

The first thing they addressed was that the test was given with the consent of the parents and the students. I never said anything to indicate it wasn't. As a matter of fact, in my letter I said "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." So I wasn't inaccurate or misinformed in that.

My letter said that it's being billed as a "suicide prevention test." Their letter called it a "suicide risk screening program." Very little difference there. Their letter said "TeenScreen is a screening program only and does not involve diagnosis or treatment as the letter insinuates." I believe Teresa Rhoades of Indiana would have to disagree with that. She has filed a lawsuit because her daughter was diagnosed and labeled at school without the benefit of her parents' presence. By the time her daughter came home from school at the end of the day, she was very distraught because she didn't understand the meaning of obsessive compulsive disorder and social anxiety disorder. I have used her name with permission and she also gave me permission to include her e-mail address. You may check the facts with her directly at mason101459@comcast.net or Google Teen Screen Lawsuits.

Their letter goes on to explain how this test is not "affiliated with or funded by any pharmaceutical companies." I find it very interesting that you should suggest that, as I never suggested any such thing in my letter. I suggested that the desire was to put the teen on psychotropic drugs. A doctor doesn't have to have any affiliation with a pharmaceutical company to prescribe a medication for a patient. The quote "me thinks thee doth protest too much" comes to mind.

You then said that teen suicide is the second leading cause of death for teens. And while any number is unacceptable, it only stands to reason that it would be second only to trauma. After all, most teens don't die of heart attacks or strokes. You made it sound as if we're in the midst of an epidemic of teen suicides. As anyone who's been following these letters can see, that's hardly the case. Teen suicide is actually very rare.

As the last letter said, do we really need a test putting ideas in the minds of emotionally healthy young people when it's highly likely that a teen who's considering suicide will show signs that family, teachers, friends or clergy will already have picked up on and be working with? I also listed some of the questions on the test. I can assure you those were neither inaccurate nor misinformed. My daughter took the test and stated unequivocally those questions were on the test. My goal was to get parents to think about what is going on with their children at school and check it out. So I very much appreciate your letter in that if people have been reading the Letters to the Editor, I have very likely achieved that goal.

Jeannie Hetzer

Ft. Madison

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...