Released on = May 7, 2006, 6:01 pm

Press Release Author = Citizens Commsission on Human Rights

Industry = Healthcare

Press Release Summary = The anti-psychotic drug deaths mark the third major category
of lethal psychiatric drugs being prescribed to millions of American children;
antidepressants now require the FDA's "black box" warning.

Press Release Body = An extensive article published in USA Today revealed that the
U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has recorded 45 child deaths attributed to
new anti-psychotic drugs, yet experts say the death toll could easily be as high as
450, as only 1 to 10% of adverse reactions are ever reported to the FDA. Equally
alarming is that the number of anti-psychotic drugs prescribed for 2 to 18-year-olds
grew from under 500,000 in 1995, to approximately 2.5 million in 2002 - a 400%
increase, while sales of anti-psychotic drugs have soared 1,500%, from $500 million
in 1991 to more than $8 billion in 2003.

The anti-psychotic drug deaths mark the third major category of lethal psychiatric
drugs being prescribed to millions of American children; antidepressants now require
the FDA's "black box" warning for causing suicidal reactions in children and teens;
an FDA advisory committee has warned that ADHD drugs should carry "black box"
warnings for causing strokes, heart attacks and sudden death in children. More than
a dozen warnings have been issued internationally on psychiatric drugs causing
children and adolescents side effects including liver damage, cardiac failure,
strokes, hallucinations, psychosis, mania, violence, suicide and death. Yet these
drugs continue to be prescribed to more than 17 million children worldwide.


Brian Beaumont, president of the Vancouver Chapter of the psychiatric watchdog
organization, Citizens Commission on Human Rights (CCHR), said, "Psychiatrists have
created a multi billion-dollar child drugging market that puts profit above
children's lives. Psychiatrists fraudulently promote childhood behaviors as
"diseases", or "illnesses" requiring the administration of powerful, mind-altering
drugs despite the lack of any blood test, brain scan or "chemical imbalance" test
that can prove any mental "disorder" is a medical condition".

Psychiatry's financial incentive for pathologizing behaviors and manufacturing
"diseases" was disclosed last month in the journal Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics,
which found 100% of the psychiatrists determining the criteria for so-called "mood
disorders" (which includes "bipolar disorder" and "schizophrenia/psychotic
disorders") for inclusion in the American Psychiatric Association's (APA) Diagnostic
and Statistical of Mental Disorders (DSM) were financially involved with drug
companies that manufacture the drugs.

Earlier anti-psychotic drugs caused a fatal toxic reaction called neuroleptic
malignant syndrome, killing an estimated 100,000 Americans. It took 20 years before
the APA issued a warning letter in 1985 to its members, and then only after several
highly publicized lawsuits that "found psychiatrists and their institutions
negligent for failing to warn patients of the drug-related risk."

Parents have charged that they have been left at the mercy of psychiatry's
misinformation and that children are dying because of it. Ellen Liversidge whose
son died in 2002 after falling into a coma from an anti-psychotic drug, states,
"There was no warning on the label and no warning from the doctor. Do we need to
have so many more people killed? Do we need a whole bunch more newspaper articles?
What is it going to take for the FDA to act?"

The Citizens Commission on Human Rights was established by the Church of Scientology
in 1969 to investigate and expose psychiatric violations of human rights. It has
been the most effective organization in the world in helping enact informed consent
laws on the dangers of psychiatric drugs prescribed to millions of unsuspecting men,
women and children.
For more information, log onto http://www.cchr.org


Web Site = http://www.cchr.org

Contact Details = Contact CCHR at 604-689-4417 or humanrights@lightspeed.ca