Daniel Heimpel – Chronicle of Social Change
In this Q&A, I interview San Jose Mercury News Investigative Reporter Karen de Sá about her explosive series on the psychotropic “drugging” of foster youth. De Sá wrangled with gargantuan California state bureaucracies to access data that tells a startling story of the foster care system’s over-reliance on psychotropic drugs. She also made sure to include the stories of current and former foster youth throughout.
This mixture of systemic analysis coupled with real-life experience is de Sá’s forte. In 2008, she wrote a series on the juvenile dependency court system using the same technique, which had lasting impact. Her latest series is still unfolding, but it is already rattling public policy around psych meds and foster youth. The Medical Board of California will start investigating whether or not Medi-Cal providers are acting reasonably when writing prescriptions to foster youth.