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Video: We Are CHD
December 03, 2023

Tennessee’s K-12 Mental Health Trust Fund

The TN General Assembly established the K-12 Mental Health Trust Fund in 2021 by passing SB 739, which became Public Chapter 595. The intent of the fund is “to provide mental health supports to students in primary and secondary schools in this state.” The state treasurer was authorized with administering the trust.

On Monday, November 20, 2023, the Board of Trust for Mental Health Trust Fund held a meeting. Bernadette Pajer provided public comment on behalf of the TN Chapter of Children’s Health Defense as part of our efforts to educate the community and public officials on the epidemic of psychotropic drug prescriptions and their impact on physical and mental health. Below is a transcript of Bernadette’s comment and hyperlinked citations.

The meeting was discussed on ‘Good Morning CHD’ on December 4, which covered the topic of prescription-driven violence.

Watch Full Board of Trustees Meeting Public comment begins at approx. 40 minute mark.

November 20, 2023

Public Comment to Board of Trustees K-12 Mental Health Trust Fund

My name is Bernadette Pajer. I am with the TN Chapter of Children’s Health Defensei. Our mission is to end childhood health epidemics by working to eliminate harmful exposures, hold those responsible accountable and establish safeguards to prevent future harm.

One of the harmful exposures impacting children’s health today are psychotropic drugsii— those drugs prescribed to children diagnosed with ADHD, depression, anxiety, and more.

Those drugs come with black box warningsiii for suicidal and homicidal ideation, increased agitation, impaired cognitive ability, aggressive behavior, mania, and a host of other neurological and physical side effectsiv. These drugs have no “off-ramps”v. Getting off of them them can be as dangerous as taking them.

As the Board of Trustees for the K-12 Mental Health Trust Fund, it is your duty to ensure that before you disburse funds, you research to the best of your ability the programs you are funding, looking for unintended consequences, such as increased access to and use of psychotropic drugs with black box warnings.

Through a recent Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, the Citizens Commission on Human Rights (CCHR) Internationalvi, a mental health watchdog organization, obtained information from the Tennessee Family and Social Services Administration on how many children are being prescribed psychotropic (mind-altering) drugs through the state’s Medicaid program.

The statistics reveal that in 2021 just for kids on Medicaid in TN:

94,058 children aged 0-17 years were prescribed psychotropic drugs, which include antidepressants, anti-anxiety drugs, stimulants, antipsychotics, and mood stabilizers. Of these, 11,453 of the children were aged 0-5.

Again – those numbers don’t include children on private insurance.

Over one-third of children in foster care (35%) filled a prescription for psychotropic medication as compared to 8% of non-foster children in Medicaid.

In all the surveys and studies recently done regarding mental health of school children, I am unaware if data was collected on how many children reporting mental health issues were on prescribed psychotropic drugs. But we do know that it is highly likely when children have increased access at school to mental health clinics, the rate of diagnosis will go up and so will prescriptions of black box warning drugs.

While we do want to ensure children struggling with issues get the help they need, we also need to be sure we don’t inadvertently increase a major driver of disturbing behaviors. We want to decrease the rate of diagnosis by increasing solutions that address the socialvii, nutritionalviii, environmentalix, and iatrogenicx root causes of mental health issues. Our goal should be to decrease labeled children and increase able childrenxi who become able adults.

My FINAL POINT is this — fiscal due diligence requires we understand the role psychotropic drugs are playing in the increase of mental health disorders in TN so that we do not inadvertently drive increased use of black box warning drugs and their devastating consequences.

Beyond the human cost, the financial burden of psychotropic drug side effects to the state is significant. From increased funding needed in schools, to increase use of Medicaid, to loss of income when fewer children graduate able to enter the job market.

It is imperative we know:

  • how many children are already on these psychotropic drugs when they ask for services?

  • Have any surveys included asking about use of these black box warning drugs?

  • Are adverse reactions being reported to Medwatchxii?

Before we fund programs, we must know these answers otherwise we will be fueling a fiscal burden like we have with opioids. The human and financial cost is unacceptable but avoidable.

Thank you.

Endnotes

i TN Chapter Children’s Health Defense https://tn.childrenshealthdefense.org

iv Negative Effects of Antipsychotic Medication https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6864560/ Please also see each product insert with specific warnings and adverse reactions.

xi Able Child – nonprofit inspired by President Eisenhower’s National Defense Education Act https://www.ablechild.org/about-us/