Healthy Skepticism Library item: 1125

Warning: This library includes all items relevant to health product marketing that we are aware of regardless of quality. Often we do not agree with all or part of the contents.

Publication type: news

Zwillich T.
Lawmakers OK Bill to Stop Rx Coercion in Schools
Reuters Health 2003 May 15

Full text:

WASHINGTON (Reuters Health) A House committee approved a bill on Thursday directing states to bar public schools from requiring children with behavior problems to take medication before they can attend classes.

Specifically, the bill directs states to come up with policies banning the practice as a precondition for receiving federal education dollars.

Some parents of children with attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and other illnesses have complained that schools required the children to take drugs, such as Ritalin, to be allowed to attend school.

Prescriptions for Ritalin and similar stimulant drugs have skyrocketed in recent years, with an estimated 3 million to 6 million U.S. children currently taking them. The explosion in use has prompted fears among some groups that the medications are used indiscriminately to control behavior in unruly children.

Lawmakers said Thursday that their bill would discourage such requirements, which are already banned by state law in Connecticut, Minnesota, Illinois and Virginia.

Teachers “don’t need to diagnose, nor should they diagnose. They’re not trained to do that,” said Rep. John A. Boehner, R-Ohio, chair of the Education and Workforce Committee.

Several Democrats objected to the bill, emphasizing that there are no reliable studies showing that medication coercion is a widespread problem in U.S. schools.

“We really didn’t have any evidence other than anecdotal evidence,” said Rep. Lynn Woolsey, D-Calif.

“We have anecdotal evidence, but it is overwhelming,” answered Rep. Max Burns, R-Ga., the bill’s chief sponsor.

The committee voted to clarify the bill’s language to make it clear that teachers should not be barred from discussing behavioral disorders or medications with parents and must only avoid policies requiring medications before class attendance.

Still, mental health groups worried that the bill could wind up having a chilling effect on contacts between teachers, school officials, and parents that often identify untreated mental disorders in kids.

“It is going to erect further barriers to treatment,” said Ralph Ibsen, chief lobbyist for the National Mental Health Association.

Lawmakers turned back an amendment that would have applied the bill’s prohibition to all psychotropic drugs, including those used to treat depression, psychosis and anxiety. They later approved language calling for a federal study of the extent of use of psychotropic drugs in U.S. schools.