San Diego State University senior Chris Kershaw first used Adderall two years ago to help cram for a final exam. The economics major doesn’t have attention-deficit disorder, which the drug is most commonly prescribed to treat. But Kershaw, like many college students, occasionally buys the drug from friends to help him study.
Psychiatrists are to give official recognition to dozens of new mental disorders, including a condition nicknamed “Mary Whitehouse syndrome” — the thrill of being appalled by pornography and other obscenities…. The condition is one of many mood disorders and personality traits that are likely to be added to the next edition of the psychiatrists’ “bible”.
On January 29, 2010, the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC) issued a formal statement that it is “seriously concerned about studies that indicate the rapid increase within a short period of time the prescription of psycho-stimulants such as Ritalin and Concerta to children diagnosed with ADHD.”
An Alaska attorney who has gone up against a drug giant and won has a new target. Jim Gottstein is taking on psychiatry in Alaska for over-prescribing medicine to children. Gottstein was the attorney who forced Eli Lilly to pay more than $1 billion in settlements over the anti-psychotic drug Zyprexa. He also heads up a group called the Law Project for Psychiatric Rights, which filed the lawsuit. The group claims over-prescribing is disabling children for life.
Critics say there’s a damaging conflict of interest with the financial ties between drug companies and experts who are revising the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-V), as well as guidelines on the best treatments. This question has been a big topic of debate not just in scientific and academic journals it also concerns the public welfare.
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