November 13, 2003
Contact: Marla Filidei
humanrights@cchr.org
1-800-869-2247

Mrs. Patty Weathers, president of Parents for a Label and Drug Free Education, says, "We realize that the Senate is extremely busy now; however, hundreds of parents continue to report that school personnel are forcing them to give their child powerful psychiatric drugs. The government spends nearly $1 billion a month to fight the war on drugs, yet millions of prescriptions for cocaine-like stimulants are written for children each year and government-funded schools are forcing kids to take them. Children who have been forced onto these drugs have died. Passage of the Child Medication Safety Act could save children's lives."

Mrs. Weathers' website, AbleChild.org lists the names of parents who report they've been coerced through schools to drug their child. Listed by their city and state, it also cites the title of the school personnel responsible for the coercion. The top five states for drug coercion are California with 41 cases; New York, 36; Georgia, 29; Florida, 26; and Maryland 25. Mrs. Weathers says that the 500 signatures on her website reflect only a small portion of the parents forced to drug their children, as the only promotion for the petition has been through referral from visitors to the website. Mrs. Weathers' own son, Michael, 8, was forced onto psychiatric drugs through his New York school only to later find his problems stemmed from never being taught phonics.

Bruce Wiseman, national president of the mental health watchdog Citizens Commission on Human Rights (CCHR) said, "Psychiatric drugs have been increasingly promoted as a panacea for educational problems, leading to more than six million children being prescribed stimulants. Teachers have been unwittingly co-opted into acting as mental health clinicians, using what some parents have called 'terror tactics' to force parents to drug their child. The Child Medication Safety Act will help repair the dialogue between teachers and parents that psychiatrists have ripped apart. The Act is needed so that parents will no longer fear being threatened with their child's removal from school if they choose not to subject him or her to mind-altering drugs."
 

The Citizens Commission on Human Rights was established in 1969 by the Church of Scientology to investigate and expose psychiatric violations of human rights. For more information contact Marla Filidei at 800-869-2247. For more information on the Child Medication Safety Act, and celebrities, parents and educators who have spoken out in support of a parents right to refuse forced child drugging, log onto http://www.cchr.org

Parents for a Label and Drug Free Education is an independent parents organization comprising parents who have been pressured to put their child on psychiatric drugs for educational failings. Log onto http://www.ablechild.org.

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