Big Brother is on the march. A plan to subject all children to mental health screening is underway, and the pharmaceuticals are gearing up for bigger sales of psychotropic drugs.
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The NFCMH recommends "routine and comprehensive" testing and mental health screening for every child in America, including preschoolers. President Bush has instructed 25 federal agencies to develop a plan to implement the Commission's recommendations.
The NFCMH proposes utilizing electronic medical records for mental health interrogation of both children and adults for mental illnesses in school and during routine physical exams. The NFCMH also recommends integrating electronic health records and personal health information systems.
The NFCMH recommends "linkage" of these mental examinations with "state-of-the-art treatments" using "specific medications for specific conditions." That means prescribing more expensive patented antidepressants and antipsychotic drugs.
Illinois became the first state to jump on board. By near-unanimous votes in 2003, the Legislature passed the $10 million Illinois Children's Mental Health Act creating a Children's Mental Health Partnership (ICMHP), which is expected to become a model for other states.
The ICMHP's plan, released on July 16, calls for periodic social and emotional developmental examinations to be administered to all children, and for all women to be interrogated for depression during pregnancy and up to a year postpartum. When the ICMHP showcased this plan with five public hearings stacked with bureaucrats and social service workers, a political tempest erupted, with state legislators saying they had no idea this was what they had voted for.
Illinois legislators were shocked to hear the details. The plan includes periodic developmental exams for children ages 0-18 years, a statewide data-reporting system to track information on each person, social-emotional development screens with all mandated school exams (K, 4th, and 9th), and report cards on children's social-emotional development.
The plan is to add mental health assessment to the state's physical examination certificate, along with mandatory immunization records. All children in Illinois, unless religiously exempt, are required to have up-to-date health examinations and immunizations for school entry.
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Parental rights are unclear or non-existent under these mental screening programs. What are the rights of youth and parents to refuse or opt out of mental screening?
It looks as if parents may not only be unable to prevent these mental screening programs, they may not even be notified when they take place.
But being a conservative nut job, Schlafly somehow convinces herself that a program created by a Republican President can be a liberal big-spending idea. Bush is the big spender and he is the one wanting your children to go through mental "screening." Its got Bush written all over it: New Freedom Commission on Mental Health? WTF? It even sounds scary.
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