Revoke the Pediatric Approval of Risperdal

[Luc]

It can be done. Let us join the effort;

Thanks to Ginger Breggin for posting about Stephen Sheller’s FDA Petition to Revoke the Pediatric Approval of Risperdal on her Facebook Page. Many of you know that Mr. Sheller recently settled a case against Johnson & Johnson (J&J) over Risperdal causing breasts to grow in a young boy, known as gynecomastia, J&J Settles Risperdal Lawsuit on Opening Day, for an undisclosed sum. What is not yet well-known is that on July 27, 2012, Mr. Sheller filed what is known as a “citizen’s petition” to revoke the approval of Risperdal (risperidone), and its cousin Invega, for use on children and youth.

This is potentially a far more important event in the struggle to stop the massive psychiatric drugging of children than the individual lawsuits over gynecomastia, as important as they are. And you have a chance to support this effort. The petition has been assigned Docket No. FDA-2012-P-0857, and people can file formal comments. The Petition is there, but it is not exactly a user-friendly site, so PsychRights has posted it here. A couple of years ago the huge number of electroshock victims who commented against reclassifying electroshock machines as having no or low risk (and also those who came to testify) had a big impact. I urge everyone to support Mr. Sheller’s petition by submitting comments. You can put comments right in the text box or upload a more substantial submission.

More at;

http://www.madinamerica.com/2012/09/...-of-risperdal/

[Dédé]

Sorry...How to sign this petition? I tried to find a link, but I didn't succeed.

Dédé

[Luc]

:) Here it goes, Dédé; http://www.regulations.gov/#!submitC...12-P-0857-0001 If you needed any more help, please let me know.

[Dédé]

Thanks a lot Luc. I've signed. It's work, I think.

I hope this petition will have success.

Dédé

[Luc]

Awesome, Dédé!

[Junior]

They DO need to consider who they prescribe these drugs to. Jason (my son) is on Risperdal but his psychiatrist warned me that it is a very powerful drug and we discussed ALL the possible side effects before opting to go ahead. I was studying psychology at the time and was actually doing a unit in neuropsych, so I asked him about the parts of the brain it affects and I looked up some research papers. He was 15 at the time and the teenage hormones, combined with the need to change his ADHD meds, and the fact he has autism were all in the mix. You can imagine how complex it all was! To his credit, his psychiatrist didn't take any of it lightly and it took us several weeks to get him off the Dexamphetamine, Catapres, and Epilim before leaving him on Prozac and introducing Risperdal.

For the record, he has had minimal side effects from the Risperdal and it worked like a charm. He is now 22 and I am currently weaning him off the Prozac but I'm still undecided what to do about the Risperdal. I certainly dont' want him to ever go through poop out and the sort of w/d that I've seen here and at another forum - but... I also remember only too well the extreme behaviour we had to endure in the past (and believe me, it WAS extreme) and note that his father has untreated ADHD, so Jason's hyperactivity isn't going to go away on its own.

Anyone want to make the decision for me?




Umm... back to the topic - I've heard of kids as young as THREE being put on Risperdal. THREE??? How the heck can they justify that? Their brains are still developing. Surely they realise that it will interfere with that?

[Luc]

Umm... back to the topic - I've heard of kids as young as THREE being put on Risperdal. THREE??? How the heck can they justify that? Their brains are still developing. Surely they realise that it will interfere with that?

It's hard to believe, but they go even further than that;


Babies Given Antidepressants In New Zealand

September 10th, 2007

Medical authorities are ‘mystified and concerned’ at figures suggesting antidepressant drugs are being prescribed for children, some less than a year old, according to a report in the New Zealand Herald. A look at records at Pharmac, the national drug buying agency, suggests thousands of scrips are being written annually for children under 10.

Normally, antidepressants aren’t usually prescribed to children younger than 8, and more commonly aren’t used on those younger than 13. And since depression isn’t found in babies – how could one tell, anyway? – docs contacted by the paper could see no reason for prescribing antidepressants for the wee ones.
The number of state-funded antidepressant prescriptions has nearly doubled since 2000 to more than a million a year, costing the Government about $30 million. Figures given by Pharmac to the United Future Party show 4,728 antidepressant scrips were written for kids younger than 10 in 2004-05, declining to 2,425 in the last June year.

Causing most alarm are the figures for babies, even though they dropped sharply during the three years. For 1-year-olds, 768 prescriptions were written in 2004-05, down to 24 by last year. For those under 1, there were 453 prescriptions in 2004-05 but only nine last year. The numbers also declined for other age groups under 10, but each group remained in the hundreds last year.

The decline likely reflect a government warning in 2004 that antidepressants could increase the risk of suicide.
“I can’t understand them,” Pharmac medical director Peter Moodie tells the paper, adding that wrong coding of dates of birth could explain the single-digit figures, “but when it’s hundreds, one assumes the figures are right”. Pharmac, he says, will re-check them and look to see which doctors had prescribed them to children and ask regulators to look at the issue.

United Future health spokeswoman Judy Turner said the figures were frightening. “Babies are born with only 15 per cent of their brain fully developed; 85 per cent of development happens from 0 to 3 years,” she tells the paper. “Surely the antidepressants will interfere with the hard-wiring of the children’s brains and influence their long-term wellbeing.”

The clinical director of paediatrics at Kidz First children’s hospital in Otahuhu, Wendy Walker, had never used antidepressants with babies, nor heard of anyone else doing so. “I would never prescribe them in my practice as a hospital-based acute paediatrician.”
John Werry, a child psychiatrist, says that “as far as we know” giving SSRIs to babies would not harm them. “But one doesn’t like to give growing and developing kids medications that affect basic bio-cyclic processes because it just doesn’t seem like a good idea unless the kid is really in severe difficulty.” He adds it would be rare prescribe antidepressants before the teenage years, and that the youngest child he had prescribed one to was a boy with autism aged 8 or 9, but that was “very exceptional”.

Auckland City Hospital neonatal paediatrician Simon Rowley says he would “never dream” of prescribing antidepressants to anyone under about 10, and was sceptical of the Pharmac figures.


More at;

http://www.pharmalot.com/2007/09/bab...n-new-zealand/

[Junior]

Oh my god ... giving antidepressants to babies????????????

As someone said:

“Babies are born with only 15 per cent of their brain fully developed; 85 per cent of development happens from 0 to 3 years,” she tells the paper. “Surely the antidepressants will interfere with the hard-wiring of the children’s brains and influence their long-term wellbeing.”

I also fail to see what possible reason there could be that would make anyone WANT to prescribe anti depressants to a baby? How the hell could a baby be suffering depression??????????????? And even if it was, how could anyone possibly know?

I want to shoot one of these doctors... but I can't find a gun in the emoticon list

[Junior]

Hmm..that article was from 2007. Wonder if they found anything after it was written?

[Luc]

Oh my god ... giving antidepressants to babies????????????

As someone said:

I also fail to see what possible reason there could be that would make anyone WANT to prescribe anti depressants to a baby? How the hell could a baby be suffering depression??????????????? And even if it was, how could anyone possibly know?

I want to shoot one of these doctors... but I can't find a gun in the emoticon list

Very true - this only shows how, incrementally, everyone has been conditioned into perceiving such outrageous abnormality as a "norm".