A recent study published in the medical journal "Archives of General Psychiatry" revealed that antipsychotic use among children in the United States has increased almost six times.
Antipsychotics are medications that are prescribed to people suffering from mental disorders, but in recent years, both in the US and in Spain they are being administered to treat pathologies such as generalized behavioral disorders, to alleviate depression, hyperactivity, aggressiveness, impulsivity ... pathologies that are not psychotic.
The study thinks that the increase of these drugs in children is due to the fact that they have fewer side effects, but these effects are studied in adult patients, so they consider that they should be studied in children, because although they are often effective, they are not known. the effects they may cause on their brains still developing, as well as the weight gain they cause, which can be much more serious in the infant body than in the adult. For very specific pathologies, there are studies on the effect of medications on children, such as irritability in certain cases of autism in which risperidone, or clozapine, a more effective drug than haloperidol, is administered. Antipsychotic classic that is given to children with schizophreniform disorder.
With this panorama, and criticizing the vision of the future that allows us to glimpse the current situation, Bret Easton Ellis has written a novel that describes American society full of children who are medicated against depression or hyperactivity. "Luna Park" is a novel that can show a future reality, it would not hurt to read it.
