Chemical Straitjackets Restrain Children

“They are sent away for help. But when they act out, some troubled children are controlled with potentially dangerous mind-numbing drugs.”

Ohio Legal Rights Service examined 500 cases involving chemical restraints in the last five years, including:

A 10-year-old boy who was chemically restrained 69 times over 80 days with doctors prescribing up to six drugs at a time, and

A 12-year-old girl who was injected six times over nine months with high doses of Thorazine, and physically restrained 31 times by as many as three men—despite a history of being physically and sexually abused.

Dr. Ellen Bassuk, associate professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, said, “The mental-health system is a mess. Not only are these places giving chemical restraints, but they’re prescribing risky combination and dosages of drugs that are as dangerous and inhumane.”

—Data taken from the excellent series: Drugged Into Submission (Day 1 Of 2), Forced Medication Straitjackets Kids, By Encarnacion Pyle, Sunday, April 24, 2005, The Columbus Dispatch