Made into an internet joke because of her disability - The story of Heidi Crowter

 On April 13  BBC News program Midlands Today aired a segment about an unfortunate young teenage girl with down syndrome who became a victim of Internet abuse after she was turned into a meme intended to make fun of people with mental disabilities.

Heidi Crowter,  a 15 year old girl from Coventry was diagnosed with down syndrome soon after her birth. Most people who are not familiar with this condition associate down syndrome with mental retardation but even though  most individuals with Down syndrome have intellectual disability  the use of IQ tests for individuals with Down syndrome has been criticized on the grounds that the educator's low expectations and the fact that IQ tests do not take into account accompanying physical disabilities, such as hearing and vision impairment that would slow the test-taking performance. Many children with Down syndrome who have received family support, enrichment therapies and tutoring manage to graduate from high school and are able to do paid work, and some participate in post-secondary education as well.
Unfortunately what it's for certain is that those diagnosed with this syndrome don't have it easy at all, as they are predisposed to all kind of diseases with increased risk for cancer,  Hirschsprung's disease,   congenital heart disease ,epilepsy and the list could go on and on.


It is hard to understand how a teenager struggling everyday to live a normal life and overcome her hardships may end up as a target for humiliating jokes.

Apparently it all started after her picture was copied from a parent support group website designed for helping people with disabilities and posted on facebook in a degrading context, featuring malicious comments.
The most famous subcaption has been "I can count to potato" originating from the movie "Ringer". Memes featuring Heidi appeared on websites like Reddit , Memebase , Memegenerator and 9Gag.

Liz Crowter, Heidi's mother was appalled after finding out that people were mocking her girl on facebook pages and tried to have those photos removed. Unfortunately that may extremely if not impossible.
People share milions of pictures and links via facebook daily and to have a human being moderate every single one of those in order to make sure no offensive material is being distributed would take way too long for a website based on speed and simplicity. And what about those other websites?

Many people have blamed Heidi's parents for coming out in public and creating a "snowball" effect by attracting attention thus making it more appealing for trolls to create even more memes. Many argued that revealing the little girl's identity has made things even more difficult for her.
Are they right and is her mother to blame ? Or could it be that laughing at people with special needs stops being so funny when those people are no longer anonymous faces in funny posts, but real persons with real feelings.

When asked by the reporter what would she tell those who are making fun of her on the internet, Heidi  replied with tears in her eyes that she would kindly ask them to stop.

Just a girl trying to live a normal life.

Cerebral palsy lawsuits

What is cerebral palsy? 

  
          Cerebral palsy is the most common term when referring to a groups of conditions affecting nerves and muscle ergo impairing locomotor skills and muscle development.         Cerebral palsy is a noncontagious chronic illness and those affected by it are faced with very difficult challenges throughout their lives.



         This condition may occur from pregnancy up to the age of three and is mainly caused by damage to the motor control centers of the developing brain hence the word "cerebral " ( the region of the brain affected) and palsy referring to disorder of movement.  Resulting limits in movement and posture cause activity limitation and are often accompanied by disturbances of sensation, depth perception and other sight-based perceptual problems, communication ability; impairments can also be found in cognition, and epilepsy is found in about one-third of cases. CP, no matter what the type, is often accompanied by secondary musculoskeletal problems that arise as a result of the underlying etiology.

Who's to blame?

      While in some cases is really hard to determine the cause, usually it happens due to certain problems during pregnancy or complications at birth such as oxygen deprivation , hypoxia of the brain and birth trauma during labor and delivery. Study have shown though , that the primary cause would be a not easily detected infection in the mother during pregnancy. 
      Post birth causes include severe jaundice, lead poisoning, physical brain injury, shaken baby syndrome, incidents involving hypoxia to the brain (such as near drowning), and encephalitis or meningitis. The three most common causes of asphyxia in the young child are: choking on foreign objects such as toys and pieces of food, poisoning, and near drowning.   
      However, each year, thousands of cerebral palsy cases are caused by medical malpractice and negligence during pregnancy and delivery. A doctor may be responsible for failing to diagnose and treat an infection in the pregnant mother. 
     Human error can be found during child birth delivery in numerous forms, from failure to detect if the baby has enough oxygen to improper use of forceps or vacuum extraction. 

Who can file a cerebral palsy lawsuit?

     Every year,  numerous malpractice lawsuit are being filed against doctors thought responsible for birth injuries. In 2011 a family in Connecticut has been awarded  a verdict of $58 million dollars. A big sum you think? Think again. Cerebral palsy is a very serious condition and it affects the child for life making it extremely difficult for him to live a close to normal life without special and often expensive treatment.
Parents of an infant born with cerebral palsy have the right to file a medical malpractice lawsuit if they believe it happened at the fault of the doctor or someone in the delivery team.
It is true that nothing can change the harm done but the damages received if they win the case may give their child a chance for proper treatment .

    

Birth defects related to Prozac

  I remember picking up my paper a long time ago and reading this very interesting title:

"Woman sues after receiving free unsolicited box of Prozac in her mail."

 and asking myself why would she be so enraged just for receiving a free antidepressant sample before realizing the implications.
    Prozac also known as the "happy pill" is a very powerful prescription drug, primarily used for treating  depression, bulimia nervosa, panic disorder, obsessive compulsive disorder and aparrently was left in  the woman's mailbox like a chocolate or perfume sample. We could easily imagine the consequences if someone else have picked it up and took it like a child for example.
   
    What made me remember that peculiar article was a study proving how Prozac, if taken during pregnancy ,may lead so very serious birth complications and birth defects in infants. Apparently the problem is so serious that the FDA has  asked the companies that make Prozac and other SSRI drugs to change the warnings they issue about possible side effects from the drugs to include the possibility that they can cause possible deadly birth defects in babies.

    While doing some research I discovered that two years previous to the FDA approval, a 1996 study published in the New England Journal of Medicine found that women taking Prozac during pregnancy were twice as likely to deliver a baby with three or more "minor abnormalities" and poorer than average neonatal adaptation. And that's just the tip of the iceberg.
     Among the birth defects that Prozac has been linked to we find:           

• Anal atresia
• Anencephaly (birth without a forebrain)
• Atrial Septal Defects
• Clubfoot
• Craniosynostosis (premature closing of sutures of the skull)
• Diaphragmatic hernia
• Heart defects
• Limb-reduction defects
• Omphalocele (babies born with organs outside the body)
• Patent Ductus Arteriosus (PDA)
• Persistant pulmonary hypertension of the newborn (PPHN)
• Pulmonary Atresia (PA)
• Pulmonary Stenosis
• Tricuspid Atresia (TA)
• Ventricular Septal Defects     

     Even so, it is still being prescribed to pregnant women all over the world. While depression is a serious matter and untreated may cause grave problems for a future mommy what is more alarming is the fact that most of the prescriptions are being handed without a proper psychiatric diagnosis often by doctors doctors who aren't psychiatrists. 
     It is one thing to use such a powerful drug when dealing with depression and it's a whole different story to make use of it just to relieve some stress , or sleep better. Common sense would dictate that one should first  talk to their doctor and inquire about possible side-effects especially when  it is enough to do a simple google search to find the testimony of so many women who reported that after taking Prozac during pregnancy , their newborns suffered from life-threatening birth defects.
      So on the one side we have a very competitive and aggressive pharmaceutical market that shoves free samples of their product in your mailbox and on the other doctors who treat antidepressants as "mood boosters" while more and more pregnant women fell victim to this lack of caring for human life.
   
      If you already fall in the latter category, all I could recommend you is to take a stand and consult a  Prozac birth defect lawyer. The pursuit of a lawsuit may not only lead to some financial compensation that could ease your situation but could also serve as an example to raise awareness and  prevent such tragedies from happening.