Citizens Commission on Human Rights of Florida (CCHR Florida)

 Please urge the below House Representatives on the Health Care Services Policy Committee to schedule the Gabriel Myers Bill – House Bill 1567 and vote YES.

Senator Ronda Storm

State Sen. Ronda Storms objects to “chemical straitjackets.”

 
Comments can be made here:
http://www.tampabay.com/news/courts/civil/in-wake-of-childs-suicide-legislature-moves-to-limit-foster-cares-reliance/1080996

St. Petersburg Times
In wake of child’s suicide, Legislature moves to limit foster care’s reliance on psychiatric drugs
 

By Cristina Silva, Times Staff Writer 
Friday, March 19, 2010  

TALLAHASSEE – A year after a 7-year-old boy heavily medicated on powerful psychiatric drugs hanged himself in his Margate foster home, lawmakers are pushing to reform state medical requirements for foster children. (more…)

Congratulations!  Today, the Florida Senate’s Children, Families and Elder Affairs Committee voted unanimously to approve the Gabriel Myers Bill, Senate Bill 2718. It still needs to go through 2 other Senate Committees.   

Gabriel Myers

On the Florida House side, the first committee needs to schedule it for a vote.

Please urge the House Representatives on the Health Care Services Policy Committee to schedule and vote YES on the Gabriel Myers Bill – House Bill 1567.

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Lots of comments are being made here: http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504083_162-20000546-504083.html (more…)

Be A Champion for Florida’s Children

  Candlelight Vigil

 April 16th, 7pm-8:30pm

 At the bridge from Clearwater to Clearwater Beach

 (city parking near the courthouse) 

In Memory of Gabriel Myers and the Right to Informed Consent

Gabriel Myers

Hosted by Dr. Elizabeth Young and the Citizens Commission on Human Rights of Florida.

We need 200 champions, minimally.

 Call to confirm-727-442-8820 or email laurie@cchrflorida.org

 Go to www.cchrflorida.org/vigil to get more information.

Comments on the below article can be made here: http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/03/02/1507445/regulations-sought-for-foster.html

Miami Herald
FLORIDA LEGISLATURE
Regulations sought for foster kids prescribed psychiatric drugs
March 2, 2010

In the wake of a Broward child’s death, state lawmakers will consider a bill designed to make it harder for child welfare workers to use mental health drugs to control foster kids.

BY CAROL MARBIN MILLER

Florida lawmakers will once again consider a measure to rein in the use of psychiatric drugs among foster children in the wake of last year’s death of a 7-year-old Broward boy who was on a cocktail of mood-altering drugs. (more…)

Florida Times Union
Florida panel wants tougher rules on drugs for foster kids
Task force investigating boy’s suicide is making final recommendations.
By Brandon Larrabee
Nov. 13, 2009

Gabriel Myers - 2007

Comments can be made here: http://tinyurl.com/florida-foster-child-drugging (short registration required) 

TALLAHASSEE — A task force investigating the apparent suicide of a 7-year-old foster child approved a list of nearly 100 recommendations concerning the use of psychiatric medications by foster children Thursday as the examination of the hanging death of Gabriel Myers continues.

The panel called for several measures to toughen accountability in the dispensing of psychotropic drugs and making sure the medications aren’t the only part of a child’s therapy. (more…)

Did you know that foster care parents receive more money if a child is on psychiatric drugs?  They are considered ‘special needs’ children, needing a higher level of care.  Hunter College’s report on Foster Care Maintenance Payments discloses that the State of Florida’s reimbursement for Foster Care in 2007 ranged from $429 to $515 per month¹.  Adoption.com reports that special needs foster parents in Florida receive $1,000 per child².  Florida’s Department of Children and Families states that a child with ADD (Attention Deficit Disorder) is considered a Special Needs child³.

Dr. Fred Baughman explains, “They [psychiatrists] made a list of the most common symptoms of emotional discomfiture of children; those which bother teachers and parents most, and in a stroke that could not be more devoid of science or Hippocratic motive–termed them a ‘disease.’ Twenty five years of research, not deserving of the term ‘research,’ has failed to validate ADD/ADHD as a disease. Tragically–the ‘epidemic’ having grown from 500 thousand in 1985 to between 5 and 7 million today–this remains the state of the ’science’ of ADHD.”^{4 (more…)}

Information: The newly-forged 1990-page “Affordable Health Care for America Act” (HR 3962) offered by the House of Representatives is filled with mental health provisions intended to prop up psychiatry as well as the pharmaceutical industry with billions in future income. Key mental health components of this House bill:

MOTHERS Act
The bill includes the language of the MOTHERS Act, to “expand treatment for postpartum conditions” and calls for the development of “improved screening and diagnostic techniques,” but makes no provisions to ensure any entities doing such research are free from conflicts of interest or pharmaceutical funding.  For example, Screening for Mental Health, Inc., and its sub-organization Signs of Suicide, who heavily promote and conduct mental health screening, received $4,985,925 from pharmaceutical companies prior to 2008, and ten leading psychiatric researchers have been exposed in the last year for failing to disclose millions of dollars in pharmaceutical payments.  Yet this bill contains no provisions for full disclosure of conflicts of interest for any “entity” that could receive federal taxpayer funded grants, do research or promotional campaigns – such as the provision in the bill calling for a national PR campaign using TV, radio public and other public service announcements to urge women be screened and seek treatment for postpartum depression.  The bill also calls for “clinical research” for the development of new treatments (drugs), but again, no guidelines for ensuring that any researchers/research entities are free from pharmaceutical funding or conflicts of interest. Section 2529, Page 1418 (more…)

NBC News

“Why would a child as young as 3 ever be on mind altering drugs?”

“Well for the past 8 months the troubleshooters have poured through reams of state documents and discovered that thousands of foster kids are on mind altering drugs.  Many of these children are barely in kindergarten.  Somc are even toddlers…”

Watch the NBC video to find out more.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ISFPJL66p4c

View this YouTube video of a teenager explaining what it is like being in the Foster Care system.  She explains what happened to her and how she was placed on psychiatric drugs and placed in restraints.  She explains, “They [psychiatric drugs] make you crazy!”

This young lady has experienced much loss in her life, but she presents herself  in such a way that you are happy for her because she is finally able to tell her story.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpYoDx53-Vs

Channel 7 – WSVN-TV (Miami/Fort Lauderdale)

A Mother’s Hope

7 News Investigation

Reported and Produced by: Patrick Fraser

Watch Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q-UlOQlg9X4

Patrick Fraser

Earlier this year a 7-year-old boy in state custody prescribed mind altering drugs threatened to kill himself, then he did. This summer another child on powerful drugs also threatened to kill himself, his mother called (a channel 7 helpline called  ”Help Me Howard”), what happened after that? Tonight here is Patrick Fraser with a story we call a mothers hope.

(more…)