Re: [RANT] Giving Mind Control Drugs to Children

["Mark M." <markm@voicenet.com>]

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On Mon, 8 Jul 1996, Mike Duvos wrote:

> Since diabetes has an organic cause, this analogy with syndromes and
> disorders defined solely by behavioral percentages fails.

Incorrect.  I am not certain if ADD has been definitely linked to a lack of a
certain neurotransmitter, but since it shows up on a PET scan, it probably is.
You say that a disorder defined only by behavioral percentage in not a real
disorder.  If the number was far less than 10%, would you then consider it
a disease.  In an earlier message, you claimed that depression is an actual
disease.  One-third of all Americans have some form of clinical depression.
Your logic escapes me.

> People with VDD would probably want to be taller, and be as successful
> as their peers at important things like basketball.  The specified 
> treatment would certainly demonstrate effectiveness in accomplishing
> this goal.  People with VDD would argue that their disease was real, 
> since it was hereditary, and could be measured with complex scientific
> instrumentation, like PET^H^H^HYardsticks.

First of all, being tall is not really important in today's society.  It used
to be that people who had certain weaknesses and disorders were killed off
according to evolution.  Since we live in a developed society, evolution no
longer has any effect on humans.  It seems that the only people who think that
drug treatment is bad for people with disorders that can cause that person to
not reach his or her potential are those who have never even been afflicted
with a mental disorder.  Nor do they know much about the subject.

> Amphetamines have demonstrated themselves to be a tricky medication even
> for psychological disorders for which they were once considered 
> appropriate.  ADD and its treatment plays very well into a society that
> seems to feel that each and every one of life's misfortunes must be
> given a name and called a disease. 

People have lost jobs because of ADD.  Everyone has to do something undesirable
at one point or another.  For an ADD person, stopping a task that is very
interesting to that person to do boring work can be very difficult.  Rather
than blaming the public schools, it is much more productive to find a way to
work around such a barrier.  Ritalin is often the best way to do that.

> Of course, no amount of reason will disuade the True Believers from
> embracing yet another disease model, and we shouldn't expect that it 
> would.  But I think it is clear to many people that the forced medication
> of children for the convenience of those who take care of them is
> getting a bit out of control.

I guess I am a True Believer.  I believe that ADD exists.  I also believe in
the theory of Relativity.  Both of these are backed by hard evidence and nearly
unanimous agreement among specialists in these fields.  There is a middle
ground between believing that every kid who is hyperactive or has a short
attention span should be on Ritalin, and saying that ADD doesn't exist and it
is just a simple misfortune.  Of course, it's rather easy to dismiss something
as a misfortune which doesn't effect you personally.

- -- Mark

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markm@voicenet.com              | finger -l for PGP key 0xe3bf2169
http://www.voicenet.com/~markm/ | d61734f2800486ae6f79bfeb70f95348
"Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four.  If that
is granted, all else follows."  --George Orwell, _1984_


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