RFK Jr. takes on Big Pharma: Can the Make America Healthy Again Commission save our kids from psychiatric overmedication?

 The statistics are staggering. Between 2016 and 2022, antidepressant prescriptions for Americans aged 12 to 25 increased by 66%. Stimulants like Adderall, often prescribed for ADHD, have become a staple in classrooms across the country. Meanwhile, antipsychotics and mood stabilizers, once reserved for severe psychiatric conditions, are now routinely prescribed to children as young as six.

This trend is not without consequences. Critics argue that the overdiagnosis and overmedication of young people have created a generation of "mental patients," where normal emotional struggles are pathologized and treated with powerful drugs. As Kennedy himself has noted, "Members of my family had a much worse time getting off of SSRIs than they have getting off of heroin."

The mainstream medical establishment, however, has pushed back. The American Psychiatric Association (APA) insists that these medications are "very effective" and are prescribed "carefully" after other treatments, such as talk therapy, have been tried. But as the number of psychiatric diagnoses continues to climb — the APA's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) now lists over 300 mental illnesses, up from just 60 in the 1960s — many are questioning whether we are medicalizing normal human behavior...<<<Read More>>>...