Ritalin Stunts Growth of Children

[Guest guest]

Ritalin Stunts Growth of Children

 

* By Mike Adams

NewsTarget.com /Truth Publishing, July 23, 2007

Straight to the Source

 

New research published in the August, 2007 issue of the Journal of the

American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry finds that

Ritalin, the amphetamine drug used to treat a fictitious medical

disorder labeled Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, stunts the

growth of children. After three years on the psychotropic drug,

children are one inch shorter and 4.4 pounds lighter than their peers,

researchers have documented.

 

The psychiatric industry, of course, has been trying to play down the

growth-stunting effects of Ritalin for at least a decade. Research

conducted over the last several years by psychiatrists working for the

National Institutes of Health initially found evidence of the drug

stunting growth of children, yet nevertheless concluded that Ritalin

carries " no long-term growth risk " to children. (Those researchers, by

the way, failed to disclose their financial conflicts of interest with

drug companies.)

 

Because of that conclusion, psychiatrists have refrained from warning

parents about the fact that Ritalin stunts the growth of their

children, focusing instead of how their children need " treatment " to

correct a " brain chemistry disorder " that was, in reality, invented by

the Big Pharma-backed psychiatric industry as a way to sell more drugs

to children who don't need them.

 

Turning schoolchildren into street junkies

 

Ritalin is an amphetamine. In street lingo, it's called " speed. "

Selling speed to children is a felony, but feeding speed to children

with a prescription is called " treatment. " The practice of dosing

children with powerful, mind-altering drugs is, in fact, a form of

chemical abuse, yet it is tolerated today because it is framed in the

language of medicine. Parents and teachers all too easily agree to the

mass drugging of schoolchildren because it makes symptoms of ADHD

seemingly go away. This drugging practice is, ultimately, pursued for

the convenience of the children's caretakers and the profits of

powerful drug companies, not out of any real concern for the health of

the children.

 

Click here to see our related CounterThink cartoon, " Adde...

 

Nutritional research has shown that the symptoms of ADHD can be

completely reversed in 80 percent of children in just two weeks by

eliminating processed foods and chemical food additives from their

diets. The so-called " disease " of ADHD is really just an expression of

behavior caused by extreme dietary imbalances. The entire theory of

ADHD can also be completely shot down by simply handing an ADHD child

an X-Box or Wii gaming system, after which the child will sit down and

engage in extremely focused, attentive and mentally demanding gaming

activities for as long as six hours without a single break, and

without distraction. If there really were such as disease as Attention

Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, such behavior would not be possible.

 

The truth is that ADHD kids aren't diseased at all: Most schools are

simply boring beyond belief, and children don't learn well by being

forced to sit still at their desks and listen to teachers ramble their

way through meaningless memorization exercises dubbed " history " or

" science " or whatever the topic may be. Children learn by doing

things, and all that extra hyperactive energy has a useful function if

it's channeled into experiential learning exercises.

 

Does Ritalin cause permanent health damage? This new research about

Ritalin stunting the growth of children does not answer the question

of whether children ever regain their normal height and body weight,

or whether Ritalin causes a permanent stunting of growth that cannot

be reversed. It does make us wonder, however, whether a drug that

stunts physical growth might also stunt the growth of brain cells and

the nervous system, leading to intellectually stunted children at the

same time that it produces physically stunted children.

 

In previous years, psychiatrists tried to argue that it wasn't Ritalin

that caused the stunting of growth -- it was the ADHD disease itself,

they claimed with a straight face! And thus, treatment with Ritalin

was the only way to return children to " normal " growth.

 

This kind of twisted, circular logic typifies modern psychiatric

medicine, which spontaneously invokes the existence of numerous

psychiatric " disorders " at the exact coincidental moment that

profitable pharmaceuticals become available to treat them. The logic

of psychiatry goes like this: ADHD is a real disease because it's in

the DSM-IV manual (the bible of fictitious psychiatric disorders).

ADHD is listed in the DSIM-IV because it's a real disease according to

a group of Big Pharma-funded psychiatrists who made it up. Thus, ADHD

is real because psychiatrists say is it! (See our related cartoon,

Disease Mongers, Inc., to see a humorous depiction of this process.)

 

Treating children like guinea pigs

 

Nobody knows the long-term effects of Ritalin use on children. As a

result, the psychiatric industry is treating children like guinea

pigs, waiting to see what might happen after someone takes these

amphetamines for a decade or longer. For all we know, Ritalin might

stunt the size of the reproductive organs of these children, too,

leading to future fertility problems. Perhaps the " Ritalin generation "

won't be able to have babies. This is just a guess, but the important

point here is that the psychiatric industry is guessing, too. Nobody

knows. Long-term testing has not been done. It's all basically a

" let's give these drugs to children and see what happens " experiment.

It's all quite typical of Big Pharma today, which treats members of

the public as revenue-producing guinea pigs who are too stupid to wake

up and realize they should be questioning the outrageous claims of

treatment now being associated with harmful prescription medications.

 

These side effects of stunting growth and altering the brain chemistry

of children might conceivably be worth it if Ritalin were actually

treating a genuine disease. If Ritalin, for example, were preventing

brain cancer in at-risk children, it might be reasonable to trade a

reduction of cancer risk with stunted growth. But Ritalin has no

justifiable medical use whatsoever and is, in fact, more a form of

chemical mind control than anything resembling real medicine. To place

the growth of children at risk in order to give them a drug so

powerful that it would be illegal if sold to children on the street is

to engage in medical madness. There is no justification for the

mass-treatment of children today with this drug other than the clever

exploitation of human beings for profit.

 

The only medically proven use of Ritalin, it turns out, would be for

parents who want their children to be short and stunted. Feed those

kids enough Ritalin amphetamines, and they won't grow up to be as tall

or have as much muscle mass as their peers. It might be a strategy

very useful for grooming children for a career as a horse racing

jockey, or growing a world-class gymnast (who are all rather short due

to the physics advantage of having a shorter body and limbs), but for

those parents actually looking to raise healthy children who express

their full genetic potential, Ritalin seems to fall short. (Ahem.)

 

For those parents looking to ruin the health of their children, on the

other hand, dosing kids three times a day with amphetamines seems to

be quite useful. But why stop there? Why not graduate to METH

amphetamines, too, and start giving your kids street meth like the

militaries of the world already give to their soldiers? It makes about

as much sense as giving them Ritalin, but believe me, if Big Pharma

could find a way to control and legalize meth, psychiatrists would no

doubt be standing by, ready to invent a fictitious disease " treated "

by meth. (Remember, too, that street meth is manufactured from drug

company cold medicines sold over the counter to children.)

 

It all makes you wonder about the Partnership For a Drug-Free America,

doesn't it? This is an organization funded in part by drug companies,

which seems to have no problem whatsoever about the mass drugging of

children with Ritalin amphetamines. The " Partnership, " in my opinion,

isn't about making America drug free, it's about making America

addicted to Big Pharma's drugs while curbing use of the competition:

street drugs. The Partnership says, " Ritalin is a valuable medicine. "

Are they on crack?

 

Click here to read about amphetamines on Wikipedia.

 

Not surprisingly, when it comes to Ritalin and the drugging of

children, it's all about the profit. The best way to market a drug is

to first market a disorder, then pitch the drug as the only known

treatment for that disorder.

 

The chemical abuse of children

 

In my opinion, what's happening today in psychiatric medicine is a

crime against humanity and a form of chemical abuse towards children.

Rather than pretending that these psychiatrists have any real medical

authority, we should instead be locking them up and prosecuting them

for these Nazi-style chemical assaults upon the population. Modern

psychiatry, through its rampant chemical poisoning of the people, has

proven itself to be far more dangerous to the safety of Americans than

any terrorist threat, and in any honest society, these people would be

stripped of their right to practice " medicine, " and denied access to

children. We need a nationwide restraining order against practitioners

of modern psychiatry!

 

I believe it is time we abolished the industry of psychiatry and its

disastrous " treatment " of children with dangerous, mind-altering

chemicals. If we continue to allow these profit-minded psych doctors

to drug an entire generation with amphetamines, the long-term

consequences to society will no doubt be devastating. Children do not

need mind-altering drugs to demonstrate normal, balanced behavior.

They simply need honest nutrition, responsible parenting and to be

kept away from refined sugars, petrochemical food additives and

processed foods.

 

Ritalin / Adderall addicts snort the meds like cocaine

 

Here's a Q & A from GoAskAlice

(http://www.goaskalice.columbia.edu/3703.html) that explains, in more

detail, the ways in which Ritalin and Adderall are, in fact, dangerous

street drugs:

 

Dear Alice,

 

Recently I have started snorting Ritalin and Adderall (not at the same

time though). I have found that the effects closely resemble that of

snorting cocaine, but are not quite as intense. I really like doing

this, because it's much cheaper than buying coke. However, I was

wondering exactly how dangerous this might be, if even at all,

considering it's a prescribed drug and I never snort more than the

average dose that you would take orally. If you could tell me what the

danger in doing this is and what I might possibly be doing to my body,

that would be great.

 

Thanks, Adderall Addict

 

(Alice answers:) Dear Adderall Addict,

 

Ritalin and Adderall are two of the most prevalent prescription drugs

used in the treatment of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder

(ADHD) and Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD). Both of these medications

are classified as Schedule II drugs in the amphetamine class. Even

though they are stimulants, when prescribed as directed by a medical

provider in standard doses for people with ADHD and ADD, these

prescription drugs assist people with AD(H)D to sustain their

attention for a longer amount of time. This allows them to study or

complete tasks at hand much more effectively minus the feelings

associated with the medications' " speed-like " effects.

 

Schedule II drugs, such as Ritalin and Adderall, however, have a high

propensity for misuse, abuse, and dependence. Widely prescribed for

school-age children by medical professionals, many adolescents and

young adults snort Ritalin and Adderall as they believe that they are

safe alternatives to cocaine. This could not be further from the

truth. First, both the potency of Ritalin and Adderall exponentially

increase when they are snorted or injected because they enter the

bloodstream directly. Second, prescription medications, especially

when they are not prescribed for the user, as with illicit drugs, do

not diminish their potential for harm. These actions make the

misuse/abuses of these substances as or more harmful than cocaine,

since the user may believe snorting Adderall and Ritalin is safe.

 

Dangerous side effects from inhaling Ritalin and Adderall include:

 

• respiratory problems, such as destruction of the nasal and sinus

cavities and lung tissue

• irregular heartbeat (heart arrhythmia)

• problems with circulation

• psychotic episodes

• increased aggression

• toxic shock

• death, in extreme cases

 

As Adderall is similar in its chemical makeup to methamphetamine, it

poses additional dangers. Extended, continuous abuse can result in

developmental problems concerning the brain and negative changes in

brain wave activity [emphasis added]. If someone misuses/abuses

Ritalin, Adderall, or both, help is necessary to stop using, not only

to prevent further harm, but also to keep the person safe during

withdrawal. Once one has become addicted to these substances, stopping

could cause withdrawal symptoms similar to those with cocaine, such as:

 

• severe depression

• psychosis

• restlessness

• extreme feelings of agitation

 

You may think that you are safer and more frugal by snorting Ritalin

and Adderall, rather than cocaine, but you are harming yourself in

similar ways. You also run the risk of arrest for having and using

these substances without a prescription.

 

http://www.organicconsumers.org/articles/article_6252.cfm