Can Ritalin kill a
child?
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Dr. Samuel L.
Blumenfeld is the author of eight books on education, including: "Is Public
Education Necessary?" "NEA: Trojan Horse in American Education," "The Whole
Language/OBE Fraud" and "Homeschooling: A Parents Guide to Teaching Children."
His books are available on Amazon.com.
On March 21, 2000,
14-year-old Matthew Smith dropped dead of a heart attack while skateboarding.
The ninth-grader had been on Ritalin since the first grade. Lawrence Smith,
father of the youngster, has testified that he and his wife were forced by
Michigan Social Services to put their child on Ritalin or else be charged for
neglecting their son's educational and emotional needs.
"His last report card was his best," says Lawrence Smith. "But it wasn't worth
it for us. Putting him on Ritalin was the worst decision I've ever made." And
that's because no long-range study had been made of the effects of Ritalin on
children who take it over a number of years.
It has also been known since 1986 that methylphenidate, the generic term for
Ritalin, causes shrinkage of the brain. A study that appeared in Psychiatry
Research (Vol. 17, 1986) states: "The data in this study are suggestive of mild
cerebral atrophy in young male adults who had a diagnosis of HK/MBD during
childhood and had received stimulant drug treatment for a period of time."
Another study published in Archives of General Psychiatry (July 1996) found that
"Subjects with ADHD had a 4.7 percent smaller total cerebral volume."
Fifty-three of the 57 subjects with ADHD had been previously treated with
psycho-stimulants. Apparently, these drugs constrict the flow of blood.
Despite these alarming findings, nearly 6 million children take Ritalin or one
of a number of other stimulants in order to attend school. According to the
Boston Globe (May 14, 2002): "New Englanders buy more of the stimulant Ritalin
and its generic equivalents per capita than residents of any other part of the
country." Believe it or not, New Hampshire is the nation's leading consumer of
methylphenidate, the generic name for Ritalin. Next in consumption is Vermont,
Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Maine.
Why such high consumption in New England? The region has more doctors per
capita, and therefore more children are likely to be prescribed medication for
so-called attention disorders. Also, New England has a high concentration of
liberals who love the public schools and are more inclined to be cooperative
when educators recommend drugging their children. In addition, more and more
adults are taking Ritalin and its competitor, Adderall.
Parents Magazine and Good Housekeeping of September 2002 had two-page ads for
Adderall XR, suggesting that life for a child could be so much better if he were
on the drug. The ad reads:
Finding the right medication may help you see a big difference in how your child
feels about himself or herself and what he or she is able to accomplish all day,
every day!
Ask your doctor if a change to patient-friendly Adderall XR could
be right for your child.
In other words, "Parents, please switch from Ritalin to Adderall." The ad then
has these cautionary words about side effects:
Adderall XR is for patients with a confirmed diagnosis of Attention-Deficit
Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)
The most common side effects are decreased
appetite, loss of sleep (insomnia), abdominal pain, and emotional lability
[instability]
Amphetamines have a high potential for abuse. Caution is advised
in patients with a history of high blood pressure or mental illness
There is a
potential for worsening of motor and phonic tics and Tourette's syndrome.
When parents are advised to put their
child on Ritalin, no examination is made to see if that child might be allergic
to its side effects. Of course, some children seem to benefit from the drug.
Otherwise, there wouldn't be 6 million children on it and other similar drugs.
But the power of methylphenadate is closer to cocaine than aspirin.
Recently, I received a call from a father being pressured by a school to put his
son on Ritalin. What did I think of the idea, he asked. I told him of the sudden
death of some children, the violent and murderous behavior of others, and the
fact that Ritalin shrinks the brain. He wanted me to tell all of this to his
wife who was inclined to go along with the school. So he put her on the phone.
She listened politely. But when I told her of the shrinkage of the brain, she
wanted to know if it produced any behavioral change. I said I didn't know, but I
thought that more brain was better than less brain.
When parents are advised to put their child on Ritalin, no examination is made
to see if that child might be allergic to its side effects. Of course, some
children seem to benefit from the drug. Otherwise, there wouldn't be 6 million
children on it and other similar drugs. But the power of methylphenadate is
closer to cocaine than aspirin.
Recently, I received a call from a father being pressured by a school to put his
son on Ritalin. What did I think of the idea, he asked. I told him of the sudden
death of some children, the violent and murderous behavior of others, and the
fact that Ritalin shrinks the brain. He wanted me to tell all of this to his
wife who was inclined to go along with the school. So he put her on the phone.
She listened politely. But when I told her of the shrinkage of the brain, she
wanted to know if it produced any behavioral change. I said I didn't know, but I
thought that more brain was better than less brain.
As far as I knew, no investigations had been made by medical researchers on what
happens to intelligence when the brain atrophies. But I got the distinct
impression that this boy's mother was not alarmed by brain shrinkage per se. If
I could not demonstrate a definite loss of intelligence or nervous-system
capability, then brain shrinkage was really nothing to worry about.
In fact, the Detroit News of Dec. 12, 2002, reported that there was indeed
nothing to worry about. The article's headline said it all: "Ritalin is safe
and it works." An excited reporter wrote:
For more than a generation, we've been "drugging" our unruly children to calm
them down. And in doing so, we have risked damaging their young brains and
setting them up for long-term drug addiction or so we have been warned.
But now, that mantra is being turned inside-out. The first long-term results of
what some have called a huge drug experiment on our children shows what almost
no one expected.
Not only do the stimulant drugs used to treat "Attention-Deficit Hyperactive
Disorder" or ADHD as it is known not damage the brain, they appear to
enhance brain growth, helping afflicted children catch up in brain size to their
more "normal" peers.
That blockbuster finding, printed recently in the Journal of the American
Medical Association, is finally easing the fears of parents afraid of these
drugs and is sending experts on a mission to get the word out.
Apparently the article in the Journal of the AMA is based on a 10-year study by
the National Institute of Mental Health. The study revealed that children with
ADHD indeed have smaller brains to begin with, but those treated with
psycho-stimulants such as Ritalin experience brain growth.
What is one to believe? The National Institute of Mental Health is a federal
bureaucracy used by Congress to justify expenditures of billions of dollars to
solve such problems as the genetic causes of dyslexia.
What about those studies cited earlier in this article showing that these drugs
reduce brain size? Apparently they were performed by experts not on the payrolls
of the drug companies and not geared to gaining federal funding. Which means
that parents must still be wary of drugs that can kill young children.