Thousands of additional young boys across B.C. are being prescribed a former diet drug called Dexedrine to control the same behaviours. The drugs are an effective treatment for children who are properly diagnosed with the disorder. But many boys become targets for diagnosis because they act up more than girls, said Pat Clarke, a B.C. Teachers Federation vice-president. Although almost as many girls as boys are believed to have difficulty with concentration, they make up only about 20 per cent of the stimulant patients. The reason lies in the way boys react to stress.
Girls deal with aggression differently.
And they are taught to do that. Boys' behaviour in an institutional setting is generally more marginal and therefore they end up on this kind of medication. Clarke says a more complex classroom mix is compounding the problem - leaving teachers with less time, and therefore less tolerance to manage behaviour problems which mostly involve boys. As a result, classroom behaviour problems are increasingly solved by the use of drugs, he said. Dr. John Blatherwick, regional health officer for Vancouver and Richmond, agreed, saying schools pressure parents and the medical community to medicate children.