(AgapePress) - A Christian educator says the National Education Association has teamed up the psychiatrists and pharmaceutical companies to promote the sale of 25 different psychotropic drugs to children.
Twenty percent of America's 50 million public school students have been declared mentally ill and are on prescription drugs like Ritalin, Adderrall, and Prozac. Dr. Richard Simonds is president of the National Association of Christian Educators and a 35-year veteran of the public school system. He says children are being placed on addicting and life-threatening drugs equal to cocaine, opium, or LSD because they have been diagnosed with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder -- or ADHD.
According to Simonds, ADHD was concocted by the American Psychiatric Association in conjunction with pharmaceutical companies in order to sell drugs.
"Those who do the diagnosis are not doctors -- they're teachers, principals, nurses, janitors -- anyone in the school can do it," Simonds says. "All they've got to do is [tell] the nurse ... 'I've been observing this kid, here's his problem, here's what he does'."
The NEA appears sensitive to what it calls "media misrepresentation" that accuses educators of encouraging Ritalin use, for example, not to help a student succeed but to help in classroom control. In information provided to new members, the educators' union states that while teachers might suspect a student has ADHD, they are not in a position to make a diagnosis -- and should be careful not to be perceived by parents as doing so.
Despite that, Simonds points out that 25 Schedule II drugs are being provided to children diagnosed with ADHD. A Schedule II drug is defined as a substance that has a high potential for abuse with severe liability to cause psychic or physical dependence.
"It's a very serious thing not only because it's harming children and frying their brains permanently, but making them permanently addicted and allowing them to feel better in class," he says. "If a kid is too hyper, naturally when they give him a drug he's going to calm down." In fact, Simonds says, the child is drugged -- "and they call that a cure," he says.
Simonds notes that schools receive a minimum of $1,300 a year for each student who is designated with ADHD.
