In addition, Dr Breggin says, stimulants can cause "agitation and irritability, anger, hostility, disinhibition, hypomania and mania."
A recent review of data by the FDA seems to verify Dr Breggins assertions. The FDA found that children on ADHD drugs had an increased the risk of psychosis, a mental disorder characterized by the inability to distinguish between real and imaginary events. The most important finding, the FDA said, was that signs of psychosis or mania, particularly hallucinations, occurred in patients with no risk factors, at the usual doses of any of the drugs used to treat ADHD.
The FDA found a "substantial portion of the psychosis-related cases were reported to occur in children 10 years or less," an age group which does not typically suffer from psychosis, the FDA said.
Most of people who have investigated the matter seem to agree that heavy metal poisoning is by far the most likely cause of the epidemic in autism spectrum disorders that erupted in the 1990s. Studies show that the mercury-based preservative, thimerosal, that was used in all childhood vaccines until recently, is the likely culprit.
Beginning in the late 1980s, the CDC began adding more and more vaccines to the immunization schedule but failed to keep track of the toxic levels of mercury that children would receive as each new shot was added to the list or the amount of mercury that infants would receive when 3-in-one shots were injected.
Nancy and Tim Hokkanen are the parents of Andy, a 6 year-old boy who was diagnosed with autism but who is now recovering from mercury poisoning. In June 2002 a neurologist prescribed Adderal for Andy.
"My son became psychotic," Nancy said, "for four days by mid-afternoon he had to be held down in a dark quiet room while he screamed himself limp."
Next the neurologist prescribed Ritalin, saying, "Usually if one drug doesn't work, the other one does," Nancy continued.
"My instincts told me that this was another disaster in the making," she said, "so I quit seeing that neurologist and began reading studies."
Nancy discovered the theory of mercury poisoning published by chemistry experts, Boyd Haley, PhD and Andrew Hall Cutler, PhD, in the study, "Autism: a novel form of mercury poisoning," which documents about 100 matching symptoms.
In November 2002, when Andy was 4 and-a-half, tests were done on Andy's hair, blood, urine and stool samples, and the test results showed mercury toxicity as well as high levels of copper and other metals, and various nutritional insufficiencies.
Within 2 weeks of giving Andy supplement including Vitamin B-6, zinc, manganese and magnesium, he showed drastic improvements in mood, behavior and abilities, Nancy says.
"We had an almost-normal Christmas," she reported, "without tantrums and bizarre behavior."
The Hokkenans estimate that their insurance company was billed about $100,000 for therapy to treat autism. "However, we never noticed any drastic improvement until we began biomedical treatment, which has cost about $2,000," Nancy says.
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