The number of Australians being prescribed medication for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder has more than doubled in five years, with new figures showing more than 400,000 people now take drugs for the common neurodevelopmental disorder as awareness rises among doctors and the public.
There were 3.2 million prescriptions for ADHD medication issued to 414,000 Australian patients in 2022, according to a health department briefing published under freedom of information laws. This is a significant increase from 2018, when 1.4 million prescriptions were given to 186,000 people.