A recent article in the Denver Post reports Denver
Health's School-Based Health Centers are screening
every student - for depression - who steps inside any
one of the 11 school-based "clinics."
Come again? Why are clinics being set up in schools
to screen children for depression? Oh, I forgot.
Depression is big business. Depression, rather than
drive, defines us. It's cool to be depressed. As if
grade inflation and the anti-capitialist mindset in
schools isn't enough of a problem for children to
contend with, now schools are playing doctor and legal
drug pusher. It's a national disgrace.
Think about this for a moment. Please. Who gets to
define depression? What really constitutes a
depression so deep it requires medication? When did
we allow depression, rather than determination, to
direct ourselves and children? Where are all the
medical professionals who prescribe exercise instead
of antidepressants? Why are suggestive survey
questions and an incomplete history enough to
prescribe children in school with antidepressants?
How can we sit back and allow our children to be
diagnosed and drugged with antidepressants - without a
fight?
Fight we must. Our children are literally being
profiled and lured into accepting a depressive
disorder diagnosis and drugs for themselves. Big
Pharma and the mental health profession know children
are a human source of job protection. The accepted
practice of blaming the entertainment industry for
leading our children down dangerous roads is silly
when the real menace facing children now are
school-based clinics, and psychiatry itself.
According to Dr. Paul Melinkovich, director of Denver
Health's School-Based Health Centers, there is "a
shortage of adolescent psychiatrists." Well, duh.
When children 15 or older can give consent for mental
health treatment, and when nurse practioners and
family physicians are prescribing antidepressants like
candy so as to impress the pharmaceutical sales
representatives who visit them, where is the need for
genuine adolescent psychiatry if ever there was a
basis for this field in the first place?
Presently, the entire landscape surrounding the issue
of depression is one of negativity, dependence and
lifelong disease management. Our children are falsely
being labeled with "chronic depression" and then told
-- right in the middle of adolescence -- you will always
have to battle this "disease."
May is Mental Health Month, and our country has a
gigantic identity crisis. Why have we accepted
depression screenings as a medical procedure when
organizations such as Freedom From Fear lead the
mental health advocacy charge with a National Campaign
on Anxiety and Depression? While the mission of FFF
is to "aid and counsel individuals and families who
suffer from anxiety and depressive illness", who
really can't see that depression screenings are free
advertising for medical professionals and
pharmaceutical companies?
Sometimes I wonder how our children would really fare
in this world if we were willing to teach by example,
instead of thinking depression screenings for the
whole family is the answer. Our schools need to teach
children the basics, not view them as depressed,
incapable of navigating through adolescence without
legal happy pills. After all, haven't we been
fighting the War on Drugs -- for a reason?
So, let's give these school-based mental health
clinics the boot. A sharp dichotomy exists between
disease mongering by adults who work in these clinics
as well as adults who work in the mental health
profession, and our children's need for knowledge and
growth.
Depression screenings don't belong in our schools.
And adults must be on guard too. I wonder if Terry
Bradshaw and Donny Osmond discovered they were
depressed and needed to be official antidepressant
spokespeople after they were screened and shown videos
by drug companies that now employ them?
Zizza serves as Vice President/Georgia of
Parents For
Label and Drug Free Education.
He writes frequently about parenting issues.
Email comments to him at:
tz777@yahoo.com
