October 30, 2009 11:08 PM
Generation Rx - Big Pharma targeting kids for profits
A couple days ago I finally found some time to review this documentary I got from Netflix - and I really urge MommyLife readers to join Netflix to have access to films and documentaries you will never find anywhere else - though you can buy this one from Amazon
First the notes from Amazon, followed by my own:
For decades, scores of doctors, government officials, journalists, and others have extolled the benefits of psychiatric medicines for children. GENERATION RX presents "the rest of the story" and unveils how this era of unprecedented change in Western culture really occurred - and what price has been paid by our society.International award-winning filmmaker Kevin P. Miller (Let Truth Be The Bias, The Promised Land) "delivers a jaw-dropping emotional ride,"* and "weaves a terrifying tale of criminal conspiracy, the mass abandonment of medical ethics, and the routine betrayal of an entire generation."* By employing the expertise of internationally respected professionals from the fields of medicine, ethics, journalism, and academia, GENERATION RX investigates collusion between drug companies and their regulatory watchdogs at the FDA and focuses on the powerful stories of real families who followed the advice of their doctors - and faced devastating consequences for doing so.
GENERATION RX is a film about families who confronted horror and found nowhere to turn for help - and how scores of children have been caught in the vortex of mind-bending drugs at the earliest stages of their growth and development. This powerful documentary also questions whether we have forced millions of children onto pharmaceutical drugs for commercial rather than scientific reasons.
This film will shock you. As a former radical leftist who is feeling every day more convinced that Obama and Company have sold out to the same political interests they railed against conservatives for, I can only beseech those on the left and right who hold truth as the ultimate virtue to come together on this issue: that Big Pharma is driving our country's economy and our children's future.
We must stop the partisan bickering to set our sites on a real enemy: Big Pharma. We need to educate ourselves and spread the word about pharmaceutical propaganda and the danger to our children. If you subscribe to Netfix, please add Generation Rx to your queue - and if you don't subscribe, please consider joining - see the button on my left sidebar.
Here are my notes from watching this powerful film:
Quotes from medical authorities:
"These drugs were never intended for children."
"Attacking the foundation of what being human is all about"
"Can't believe the hiding of information, lying and fraud that has been perpetrated on the American public."
10 million American children are currently taking prescription drugs. They are labeled as defective children.
In 1990 pharmaceutical companies decided to expand their markets by targeting children with drugs previously only prescribed to adults. In order to reach this untapped market, kids would be branded. This was not a scientific venture, but a commercial one.
Prescription drugs for children which affect the chemical balance of the brain is now a $69 billion/year industry - that's $130,000. per second.
The drug companies have even targeted kids directly - there's a coloring book which tells the story of a boy whose best friend moves, which makes him sad. Now he takes a drug every day to help ease the sadness. The end.
As a counselor points out, best friends move away. Pets die. People die. If a child is not allowed to develop coping skills while growing up, how will he be able to take on serious adult problems later?
Children in foster homes and group homes are most at risk.
Instead of listening to the drug companies about the benefits of dopamine blockers, parents should read the lengthy warning labels: obesity, diabetes, brain development (many others were cited too fast for me to write down).
The big question: Are children in need of these drugs or have parents lost their way?
Giving children these drugs is like a chemical lobotomy. They can no longer qualify as having free will.
Kids who are intellectually gifted can have the same symptoms as what was originally called ADD - now ADHD.
Ironically, schools have signs saying they are Drug-Free Zones and yet school murses are dosing millions of kids each day.
Considering the drug companies' 1990 decision to push medications for kids: Between 1990-1994 there was a 6-fold increase in the consumption of ritalin.
Ritalin causes brain atrophy, seizures, paranoia, strokes, aggression (8 of the 13 major school shootings were by kids on drugs prescribed by their doctors). Typically, these kids are the diagnosed with bipolar disorder and put on stronger drugs -
"all because a kid was fidgety in school."
"We are not allowing children to mature. A child needs to know they are a good person and find themselves, We need to be capturing their creative energy rather than stifling it."
Ritalin Nation
In Atlanta, 1/3 of the student population is on ritalin, adderal, concerta, etc.
Teachers with children who are not the model child refer their parents to doctors to get their children drugs. The doctor may find nothing wrong, but already the child has been labeled as abnormal by the school. In effect, teachers are prescribing and saying to doctors, "If you won't write the prescription, we know someone who will."
We are medicating healthy, normal kid sinto the ground.
The last segment of this riveting documentary reveals the history of corruption between the drug industry and government (specifically the FDA) with footage from 1991 hearings on the Prozac/suicide connection. There was emotional footage from relatives who'd lost a loved one - often to a brutal and punishing end - and women who'd lost their sanity after being given Prozac for weight loss.
Despite the testimony - and despite the fact that similar hearings in Germany concluded that there was a Prozac/suicide connection - the FDA concluded there was no connection at all.
How did this happen? Because almost everyone on the committee was working for drug companies.
How could that be?
Rule #1 says committee members must have no conflict of interest.
Rule #2 says Rule #1 can be waived - and 50% of the time it is.
"Where did it come from, this blind trust we put in the drug companies?" It is hard to believe that money could corrupt such an important industry, but it does and this film documents the ties.
The fact is that pharmaceutical companies pay for testing, advertising, continuing education of doctors and lobbying state agencies. Everything concerning drugs is under their control. And they enjoy the profits.
Now back to my thoughts: Think about how our lives are conditioned to seek instant relief from any affliction. I find especially galling the marketing to my generation - Aging Baby Boomers - medications to combat issues likd high blood pressure and indigestion, which can be cured through changes in diet.
And what about Viagra - isn't that all about not accepting the natural aging process but feeling entitled to a young stud's sex life? Blech.
I've written of the marketing of anti-depressants on daytime TV - to appeal to wornout moms. And now there is a bill before Congress require post natal evaluations of moms with the express purpose of sending them home with anti-depressants to ward off depression. I've given birth nine times and depression was part of the aftermath which women have muddled through forever.
The problem isn't that we have problems. The problem is that we somehow feel entitled not to have them - and Big Pharma has built an empire out of encouraging that feeling.
But the issue that comes up with children is destroying their humanity and robbing them of their free will. Mothers of sons need to understand that their fidgety sons are normal. It's our job as parents and teachers to respect who they are and to channel their energy. The lazy way out is giving them drugs - and creating generations of already hooked kids who haven't been confronted with the human task of working their way through childhood and teens, discovering who they are and learning to deal with the ups and downs of life.
If anyone is pushing the idea of drugs for your children. tell them to Back Off. See this film and see what you think.
See all my articles on Big Pharma.
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Comments
My husband and I watched a relative get pressured by his son's public school teacher and administration into giving his son medication for ADHD.
The father was dead-set against medication, but the mother (they are divorced) felt it would make her job easier. Eventually, the mother and the school won. But I don't believe this was helpful to the son who still struggles a decade later.
Sad to know this scenario is being played out in millions of families.
Posted by: Elizabeth M. Thompson | October 31, 2009 3:28 PM
A relative of mine got both of her young daughters (grade school) diagnosed with bipolar and put on meds, against her husband's will. They ended up divorced. It is a constant challenge to raise kids and many women don't have time or patience for it anymore. I guess they are "fulfilling" themselves in other ways. Sad times we live in, and getting worse.
Posted by: evergreen | October 31, 2009 9:12 PM
I have celiac disease, for which the only prescription is a gluten-free diet. This disease is grossly UNDER-diagnosed in the U.S. compared to other developed countries (like Italy, Ireland, Finland...). A doctor quoted in "The G-Free Diet" (Elizabeth Hasselbeck) hypothesized that the underdiagnosis comes from the grip pharmaceutical companies have on the medical field in this country. One cannot take pills for celiac disease. Therefore, it is not profitable for drug companies to research it or support programs that do.
Posted by: Jennifer | November 1, 2009 5:51 PM
I was diagnosed in college with ADHD and Bipolar mania. Looking back on my behavior and academic record/teacher's notes over my k-12 years it was obvious (hindsight is 20/20) that I had problems. However, I managed to make it through school with flying colors. Since my diagnosis I have been taking medication to control my symptoms.
As much as I wish my mother accepted the fact that I have a problem, I am glad she never had me put on medication at a young age. As an adult, I have been able to make informed and rational decisions concerning my mental health and am functioning quite well, probably better than if I had been on meds during the most important years of cognitive development.
Unfortunately while there is a problem of kids being over diagnosed, there is also a problem of children in clear need of help not being diagnosed or mis-diagnosed.
Posted by: Courageous Grace | November 2, 2009 4:31 PM
To Ms. Curtis: To Barbara: thank you first and foremost for bringing my film GENERATION RX before your devoted readers. I thank you for this intelligent discussion about the use of psychiatric medicines in children. It is all-too-rare in our world as we know it.
To Courageous Grace and others:
I greatly appreciate your insightful commentary. . .it is indeed vital to hear about your case, as it symbolizes countless others. I found it interesting that you "managed to make it through school with flying colors," without drugs. While this must have been stressful for you, the fact that you did so is cause for both applause and acknowledgment. Your dogged commitment to your academics deserves kudos.
I have always considered GENERATION RX to be "the rest of the story," as it states above. For, how can a parent — or ANYONE for that matter — make a vital decision about ANY important health challenges without ALL of the data and information? In the case of children, so may kids are being dumped into the wastebasket of "ADHD" that many of the young people who TRULY NEED the help do not get it.
In my opinion, we live in an age of hypocritical parents: the ones who smoked pot or dropped acid in the 60s, 70s and 80s, but who now demand CONTROL over their children. They had THEIR freedom...but their kids...not so much.
I want to state publicly — as I have done many times — that I am NOT trying to completely eliminate the use of these drugs, as others have charged. What i AM committed to is providing credible information to the general public in order to allow informed choice. If, after seeing GENERATION RX some parents decide that one of the psychiatric meds are right for their child, so be it. After being presented with all of the critical information, they should do what they think is best.
I call this "medical freedom of choice."
Finally, as Barbara mentioned, I have made GenRX available online at Amazon for a mere $1.99. Just so you know, I think we only make 30 cents per rental or something to that degree, so it certainly is not driven by profit. No, we placed it online for those people who either could not afford the DVD — or who simply wanted to "rent" a digital copy online to watch on their computers.
It is an important topic. I researched this for years prior to producing GenRX. It is information you can trust — and is important to share with others.
If you like it — or even if you don't, blog about it, just as Barbara has so graciously done. Tell others. Request a copy for your local library or schools. Be proactive.
Many thanks again to Barbara for her kind review. I wish you peace.
Kevin P. Miller
Writer/Director/Producer
GENERATION RX
Blog: kevinpmiller.blogspot.com
Posted by: Kevin P. Miller | November 6, 2009 7:25 PM
