Gillard government's social engineering for 3 year olds

It is extraordinary that the Gillard government - which finds it difficult to handle its core functions - should engage in something which has nothing to do with them. Worse, experts say is a potentially dangerous social engineering project. This is not about adults. It’s about little children. Three year olds – yes 27, 000 three year olds - are to be screened. They’re to be for early signs of mental illness. The misnamed ''Healthy Kids Check'' programme seeks out children who show troubling behaviour. This apparently relies on such things as sleeping with the light on, having temper tantrums or extreme shyness as signs of possible psychological problems. The program is expected to identify more than 27,000 children. But some mental health experts fear children may be misdiagnosed or given psychiatric drugs unnecessarily. Dr Alan Frances, a professor from the prestigious psychiatric and behavioural science department at America’s Duke University says accurately predicting mental illness in three years old is simply impossible. He warns that that any effort to pick out the one truly high-risk child will doubtless mislabel a dozen or two who aren't. He slams this as intrusive, stigmatising and worrying. I will distort parenting and may lead to harmful interventions. And on top of this there is a total waste of scarce resources. These could be better reserved for the currently underserved mentally ill.

He says changes to the psychiatrist bible, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders are partly responsible for the epidemics of autism and attention deficit disorder. There was a 40 fold increase in the diagnosis of childhood bipolar disorder. This has led to a consequent wild over use of harmful and intrusive medications.
Dr Francis says Australians taking the risky step of giving its experts free rein in devising wasteful and possibly risky social engineering prospects