Kids' Heads Checked While U Wait

The Minnesota Legislature is looking into a proposal to have all Minnesota childrens' mental health checked at least once before preschool.

As usual, Matt Abe at MERN is on the case:

Mental health screening is subjective and inaccurate in children. Diagnoses very often reflect simple behavioral issues or "politically incorrect" attitudes and values. Powerful medications with serious side effects are almost always used as the treatment. Using drugs to control behavior is dangerous and wrong, especially when study after study has shown these drugs to be ineffective and dangerous. Prescriptions for psychotropic drugs for children have increased by 300% in ten years!

As has, naturally, funding for public school "special ed" programs to "deal" with the issues that the screening is designed to uncover. Remember; while school district funding in Minnesota average somewhere around $10,000 per student (higher in the Metro, lower outstate), when the "special ed" label is slapped on, the average funding rises to $30,000 per student, regardless of the "Mental Illness" associated with the child.

Much, much more on this in some upcoming posts.

You can learn more about this issue at an evening sponsored by EdWatch, "The Dangers of Universal Mental Health Screening Legislation in Minnesota," 6:30 p.m., Thursday, March 2, 2006 at the Green Mill Restaurant in Plymouth. The speaker will be Dr. Karen Effrem, M.D.

Read the rest of Matt's post for details.

Again - I've only begun with this topic.

Posted by Mitch at February 22, 2006 12:34 PM | TrackBack