Latest news with #MakeourChildrenHealthyAgainAssessment
Yahoo
22-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Farmers fear ‘Make America Healthy Again' impact on glyphosate
A farmer tills a harvested corn field in late October near Boone. (Photo by Cami Koons/Iowa Capital Dispatch) Farmers with Modern Ag Alliance, a coalition that has been pushing for the adoption of pesticide labeling policies that would make it more difficult to build cancer-related lawsuits against pesticides, fear the impact of an upcoming 'Make America Healthy Again' report they believe will target pesticides. The farmers said on a press call Wednesday an attack on pesticide chemicals, specifically mentioning glyphosate in the widely used Roundup herbicide, would be 'a terrible development for American agriculture' and lead to higher food costs for the American consumer. U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. testified Tuesday to U.S. senators and said there is not a 'single word' in his agency's upcoming report that 'should worry the American farmer.' Scott Henry, a farmer from central Iowa, was not persuaded by the secretary's remarks. He noted Kennedy's past as an environmental law attorney who said, several years ago, he believed hog farmers were worse than Osama bin Laden. 'I think it's hard to have been compared to al Qaeda in the past and then be told that I'm a partner now,' Henry said. Henry said if the report, which is anticipated to be released Thursday, contains anti-glyphosate guidance, and policymakers follow suit, it will cause commodity yields to drop, prices to increase and food inflation to 'more than double.' A report on the impact of a farm bill that doesn't allow the use of glyphosate found that consumer food inflation would increase 2.4 times. 'The biggest thing that I want to make clear today is that if the MAHA commission's report drives future policy decisions, food prices will go up, and instead of making America healthy again, we'll be making America hungry again,' Henry said. Modern Ag Alliance reports input prices for farmers could more than double without access to glyphosate. Henry said these costs would be passed up the supply chain and to consumers. 'The American farmer still has the best interest of the consumer in mind,' Henry said. 'We want them to buy food, we want it to be cheap, we want it to be safe, because don't forget, we feed our children these same products. So for somebody to tell us that we don't care about them is a true slap in the face.' An executive order from President Donald Trump in February created the Make America Healthy Again commission and tasked it with developing a 'Make our Children Healthy Again Assessment' to evaluate the chemicals, pharmaceuticals, food ingredients and other factors that contribute to childhood chronic disease in the country. Kennedy has spoken publicly in the past about glyphosate and alleged the common weed-killing chemical causes cancer and other health concerns. Roundup's manufacturer, Bayer, holds that the product is safe to use, as does the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency which reviews and certifies pesticides in the country. The company, however, has spent billions defending lawsuits in which plaintiffs allege the product gave them cancer. This led the company to partner with ag groups through Modern Ag Alliance and push for state legislation across the country, including in Iowa this year and last, to block lawsuits built on failure to warn claims. The bill did not advance through the House in Iowa, but has been signed into law in both North Dakota and Georgia. Modern Ag Alliance promoted the legislation, largely through ad campaigns. Elizabeth Burns-Thompson, the executive director of the alliance, said the attention to the MAHA report is much like the push for state policy on the issue. 'No different than how we have been trying to work proactively in many of the state legislative chambers on providing clarity and consistency so that farmers have these tools available today, and in the future, we see similar themes here and why we're working towards it at the federal level,' Burns-Thompson said. Henry said the report itself might not have a direct effect, but could lead to 'shifts in policy' that would send farming back to the practices of his grandfather. 'Today, hundreds of people can eat because of one individual farmer's efforts, and it's all due to tools like glyphosate and Roundup that allow us to do more with less and make safe, clean, affordable food available,' Henry said. SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
Yahoo
05-03-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
RFK Jr. has targeted antidepressants for kids. How do SSRIs work?
In the first directive since his nomination to secretary of health and human services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. thrust psychiatric medications and their use among children into the national spotlight. The Trump administration introduced the initiative "Make our Children Healthy Again Assessment" in a February executive order that aims, in part, to "assess the prevalence of and threat posed by the prescription of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, antipsychotics, mood stabilizers, stimulants, and weight-loss drugs" within 100 days. Kennedy, who is not a physician and has no medical or public health training, has said that the class of drugs known as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, or SSRIs, are harder to give up than heroin, and that school shootings became prevalent only after the introduction of Prozac, a common SSRI drug. These statements are riddled with falsehoods, according to health organizations, psychiatrists and researchers. Related: Wisconsin health community expresses mix of curiosity and concern over RFK Jr. nomination Related: Does Wisconsin have fluoride in its water, and is it good or bad for you? 6 things to know Dr. Marcia Slattery, a physician and professor of psychiatry and pediatrics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, focuses on anxiety disorders in patients between 5 and 18 years old. She could not speak to any of Kennedy's claims, but offered her expertise on SSRIs and their role in children's mental health. Here's what to know. Serotonin is a neurotransmitter in our brains associated with mood and emotions, sleep, appetite and digestion, learning and memory, pain perception and even bone health. Neurotransmitters carry messages between nerve cells in the brain, called neurons. Typically, once a signal is passed between neurons, serotonin is reabsorbed in those cells, a process called "reuptake." SSRIs block this process of reuptake, which increases serotonin levels in your brain. That enables the brain to continue using serotonin to connect more dots as we go about everyday tasks. Emotions also factor into how we think, problem solve and pay attention, Slattery said, and can affect the brain in ways that go beyond lifting some of the fog of depression and anxiety. "Taking the medication basically is allowing the brain to operate in a healthy manner, in a normalized manner, that allows the kid to then engage," Slattery said. Prescribing medications is never the first step in treating children and adolescents, Slattery said. The psychiatrist or pediatrician works to better understand the bigger picture of a child's circumstances before taking out their prescription pad. A child's school environment may trigger anxiety, learning problems and bullying. Family dynamics can also play a role. That said, medication helps to normalize the brain of a child experiencing severe anxiety and depression, Slattery said, which can allow a child to move forward and function more effectively, whether at home, at school or in social settings. "When we do use medication, it still should be in conjunction with all these other non-pharmacological interventions," Slattery said. "That link gets lost a lot. People think all we're doing is prescribing medications as soon as a kid comes in and says they're anxious or they're depressed. That's not the case by a long stretch." SSRIs can be life-saving medications, Slattery said. Just as a pediatrician wouldn't ignore a child's severe asthma attacks, a psychiatrist or pediatrician isn't going to ignore signs of severe depression and anxiety, which are associated with higher risks of suicide and substance abuse, academic declines, decreased school performance, and "a lot of peer-social interaction problems," Slattery said. During the pandemic, alarms rang out from different pediatric health groups about the youth mental health crisis. COVID exacerbated the burgeoning crisis among children and adolescents. Between January 2016 and December 2022, the monthly antidepressant dispensing rate increased by 66%, according to a 2024 study from the American Academy of Pediatrics. At the same time, however, the decision to prescribe SSRIs for children and adolescents for depression and/or anxiety was largely found to be appropriate, another study published in the American Academy of Pediatrics concluded. The use of SSRIs aligns with a grimmer fact: teenagers say they're more anxious, depressed and suicidal than they were prior to the pandemic. In Wisconsin, more than half of high schoolers reported having anxiety, 35% reported depression, 21% said they've intentionally harmed themselves, and 19% have considered suicide, according to the 2023 Youth Risk Behavior Survey. Related: 'An urgent and difficult message': 59% of Wisconsin youth feel anxious, depressed or suicidal Related: Youths in both urban and rural Wisconsin report troubling levels of food insecurity, poor mental health Taking an SSRI doesn't have an immediate effect on the brain. It's a gradual change in the brain that targets a specific neurotransmitter, Slattery said. "Literature would show that these are not addictive medications, and you're not on them for life," Slattery said. Opiates like heroin activate the brain's reward system, releasing the chemical dopamine, a hallmark of addiction that inspires feelings of euphoria and bliss. SSRIs, by and large, only target serotonin and have little effect on dopamine. Comparing serotonin receptor sites with opiate receptor sites "is night and day," according to Sean Leonard, a psychiatric nurse practitioner from San Diego who focuses on addiction medicine told USA Today. As with many medications, abrupt cessation can lead to symptoms of withdrawal according to the Canadian Medical Association Journal and are typically mild, producing flu-like symptoms, nausea and imbalance, among others. After months of stable functioning in a patient, Slattery said she starts tapering down the dosage. In cases where anxiety crops up during that time, Slattery helps her patient use the skillsets developed in therapy to manage and cope with stress. Slattery said it's better to reframe this question. Has severe depression or anxiety changed who you know your child to be? SSRIs will change a child like any medication would. But Slattery described the change more as a release. "It's like being unwrapped from cellophane. Your child is now able to experience the world and feel good about him or herself, and engage in life," Slattery said. "And so you will notice a difference in your child, but in a healthy way." No. Studies have yielded no causation between school shootings and psychotropic medications like SSRIs. A majority of school shooters had no history of taking these medications. On the other hand, people with untreated serious mental illness are more likely to be victims of violence or self-inflict harm than be violent toward others. Executive Order, Establishing the President's Make America Healthy Again Commission, Feb. 13, 2025 Jeffrey Kirchner, Is Robert F. Kennedy Jr. qualified to lead Health and Human Services?, Nov. 24, 2024 USA Today, RFK Jr.'s misinformation on antidepressants matters. Here's what to know, Jan. 30, 2025 Mayo Clinic, Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), Sep. 11, 2024 Zoom interview, Dr. Marcia Slattery with University of Wisconsin-Madison, Feb. 28, 2025 American Academy of Pediatrics, AAP-AACAP-CHA Declaration of a National Emergency in Child and Adolescent Mental Health, Oct. 19, 2021 American Academy of Pediatrics, Antidepressant Dispensing to US Adolescents and Young Adults: 2016–2022, Feb. 26, 2024 American Academy of Pediatrics, Anxiety and Depression Treatment in Primary Care Pediatrics, April 17, 2023 Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction, Wisconsin Youth Risk Behavior Survey Summary Report 2023, July 31, 2024 StatPearls, Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors, May 1, 2023 Canadian Medical Association Journal, Antidepressant discontinuation syndrome, May 29, 2017 Behavior Science Law, The myth of school shooters and psychotropic medications, Sep. 12, 2019 Psychiatric Services, Risks for individuals with schizophrenia who are living in the community, October 2001 This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: What to do know about SSRI antidepressants for kids, targeted by RFK
