Prescriptions for Ritalin are up 600 percent this decade. If the current rate of increase continues, by the year 2000, some 8 million American schoolchildren will be on the drug.

The United States uses five times more Ritalin than the rest of the world combined.

Some 800,000 children are on antidepressants; 500,000 are on adult antimania or antiseizure drugs; 350,000 children are on stimulants as well as either an antidepressant or antiseizure drug.

The United Nations' International Narcotics Control Board has twice voiced concerns about America's growing dependence on Ritalin.

According to a new DEA report, in some U.S. schools a staggering 20 percent of students are medicated.

A study published in Science (Sep 1997) found no conclusive evidence of the long-term benefits of stimulants in treating ADD. Drug companies do not know how stimulants work and warn against their long-term use.

According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the Public Health Service, the National Institutes of Health and the National Institute of Mental Health, 80 percent of those who were medicated as children will need to continue medicating as teenagers and 50 percent as adults.

Ritalin and other stimulant medications have serious side effects and are habit-forming. Among the side effects are nausea, insomnia, slowed growth, reduced appetite and depression. It is not uncommon for a child to be on Ritalin and an antidepressant at the same time.

Only about 70 percent of ADHD children tolerate Ritalin; others become ill.

The DEA warns that Ritalin and cocaine share virtually the same properties.

Source: Gene Haislip, former deputy assistant administrator, Office of Diversion Control, U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency, Washington, D.C.; National Institutes of Health, Washington, D.C.