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The Over-Prescribing of Psychoactive Drugs to Children: A Scourge of Our Times

Wednesday, September 1st, 2010

The Huffington Post

September 1, 2010

by Dr. Ronald Ricker and Dr. Venus Nicolino

Today, the administration of psychoactive drugs to children (6-17) is all too common and growing at an alarming rate. These drugs often cause the opposite of the intended effect, often condemning children to a life of misery and ill health. The prescription of these drugs is said to treat “chemical imbalances” which were said to cause ADHD, Depression and Bi-polar disorder. It turns out, however, that what we were calling “disease-causing chemical imbalances,” is simply incorrect . The sad irony is, the inappropriate use of these medications is in fact creating different chemical imbalances, which do cause mental disorders, many of which are both life-long and debilitating.

Furthermore, it is now clear that often we are diagnosing ordinary childhood and adolescent behavior as mental disorders (Wait, children are supposed to be bursting with energy? It’s normal for a teenager to be moody and aloof?). This diagnosing is not only based on this idea of “chemical imbalances,” but also a general and pervasive notion that every non-acceptable behavior is due to a mental illness. And last, but certainly not least, the prescribing of these medications by doctors is based on the disinformation provided them by the FDA, drug manufactures and often fraudulent studies, all in the name of making money, on the backs of our children.

In a recent lecture, respected journalist, writer and Nobel Prize Nominee, Robert Whitaker (PBS, Boston, June 15, 2010) highlighted not only the appallingly unscientific methodology used in the development, prescription and use of psychotropic drugs in school-aged children, but also how hopelessly corrupt and failed the systems that should be regulating the safety of medicines are in this country.

Unfortunately, many drug companies exist for one reason: to make money. As such, the people who run these companies have developed a worldview bereft of any more notion of ethics or morality than British Petroleum. Some drug companies’ success is not based on a drug’s usefulness or the safety of its products, but whether it makes money. The path to more money is simple: find new uses for their old drugs, invent new drugs and find new markets for both new and old drugs. Unfortunately, children are today’s newest market.

The FDA requires a “Successful Drug Trial” to approve new medications. “Trial” is often a misnomer, as the word implies some notion of impartiality and unknown outcome. These “trials” often are more like kangaroo courts. In one “trial,” in this case to prove the usefulness of Prozac, corruption and dishonesty were the rule. Children who responded to placebos were removed from the data, as were negative responders to the actual drug. This meant that the only children who were left in the study group were so-called “positive responders.” And, even then, the researchers and doctors, whose “research” funding was provided by the makers of Prozac, were the very ones to decide which subjects, if any, actually did respond “positively” to the drug. This, of course, is a massive conflict of interest. The doctors, researchers and drug companies all want the same thing — FDA approval and to make more money.

In a 2004 article published in perhaps the most prestigious British medical journal, Lancet, said the trial studies used to provide proof of the usefulness of anti-depressant drugs in children, were “nothing but fraudulent.” Following that assessment, all anti-depressants but Prozac were banned in the UK for use on children. (The fact that Prozac was not banned was based on very dubious, some say dishonest, research as documented above).

The true damage caused by the use of anti-depressant drugs like Paxil, Zoloft, Prozac, etc. (AKA of SSRI’s: Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors) by school-aged children is only found by legitimate, longer studies, like those that continued from 17 months to six years. In one study, 25 percent of children who had been on SSRI’s for three years were re-diagnosed with the much more serious disorder of Bi-polar disease. This number increased to 50 percent after six years of SSRI use. Long-term use of new anti-psychotics may lead to even greater problems than the initial disease. Diabetes, morbid obesity and early death have all been linked to the use of these drugs. And, as written by us in a previous blog both short and long term use of stimulant drugs such as Adderall), have numerous serious side effects.

Read the rest of this article here: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-ronald-ricker-and-dr-venus-nicolino/the-prescribing-of-psycho_b_665838.html

Note: To view all international drug regulatory warnings and studies on psychiatric drugs including those issued specifically for children,visit CCHR’s psychiatric drug search engine here: http://www.cchrint.org/psychdrugdangers/drug_warnings.php

Also see this video – Drugging Our Children: Side Effects – http://www.cchrint.org/videos/

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Psychiatric Meds 101: A Surprising Discovery

Tuesday, July 20th, 2010

By Shane “The People’s Chemist” Ellison
Author, Over-The-Counter Natural Cures

I may be a perfect candidate for psychiatry.

I ask questions with period marks to shorten conversations. I avoid eye contact with strangers in fear (maybe it’s anxiety) that I might learn too much about them. I secretly think that Metallica would be making better music if they went back to bludgeoning themselves with party drugs and alcohol, instead of “therapy.” I’m trying to master the Law of Un-attraction to shield myself from a “real job,” small homes and junky cars.  And, I’m constantly giving my children advice, only to give it to myself.

Psychiatry, can your drugs help me?

Perhaps these questions are what motivated me to pursue a career as a drug design chemist, winning multiple awards for my work. Nothing gets me more excited than drugs and how they affect the body (except my wife’s abs). I’ve studied their molecular anatomy, risked life and limb to mix and match explosive chemicals in a round bottom flask, and even sold my soul to Big Pharma in exchange for a lab bench and chemical hood.

During this time, I’ve made some surprising discoveries about psychiatric meds, which include antidepressants, antipsychotics, stimulants, and anti-anxiety drugs. Understanding what I’ve learned will protect you from the flood of side effects that are now being discovered at breakneck speeds, courtesy of the myriad of patients being prescribed psychiatric drugs in the name of mental health.

Your Own Personal Hell

Antidepressants strive to increase the levels of a “coping” molecule known as serotonin in the brain. It supposedly helps us find happiness when it’s covered in an avalanche of nastiness. But, it’s never been proven. Still, the drugs attempt to boost serotonin by “selectively” stopping the “reuptake” among brain cells. This is where the whole SSRI acronym came from—“selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor.” It’s a slick name, but a stupid idea. Nothing is selective in the body.

While trying to block the reuptake of serotonin, antidepressants can also prevent its release and that of another brain compound known as dopamine. The areas of the brain responsible for release and reuptake of these neurotransmitters are so damn similar (after all, they work on the same molecule) that an antidepressant drug isn’t smart enough to understand which one it is supposed to work on. So it does what any dumb drug would do, it blocks both. That’s why users usually carry a glassy stare in their eye. Fully under the psychiatric spell, they’ve tuned out.

Deep sadness, fear, anger and aggression can set in over time. By removing serotonin and dopamine from the brain, long-term antidepressant users can’t find or feel happiness. Instead, they may become buried in the avalanche of nastiness. And if you can’t find or feel happiness in life, what’s the point? What’s going to stop you from snapping your own neck or spraying bullets on your classmates? Not much when you live in your own personal antidepressant hell.

Think this is all opinion?

According to the FDA, antidepressants can cause suicidal thoughts and behavior, worsening depression, anxiety, panic attacks, insomnia, irritability, hostility, impulsivity, aggression, psychotic episodes and violence.  Some even cause homicidal ideation according to the manufacturers. Many long-term antidepressant users will tell you they no longer feel normal emotions—they’re numb, like zombies.

But the side effects of these drugs aren’t limited to hijacking your feelings and emotional state, causing violent and psychotic states. Physical side effects occur too and include abnormal bleeding, birth defects, heart attack, seizures and sudden death. Over one hundred and seventy drug regulatory warnings and studies have been issued on antidepressants, to sound the alarm on these side effects.

For Elephant Use Only

Psychiatrists prescribe antipsychotic meds such as Zyprexa and Seroquel, for anything from schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, delusional disorder, psychotic depression, autism or anything else they can think of, even “pervasive developmental disorder,” which is perfect for boosting sales because it targets children who suffer from irritability, aggression, and agitation. It’s a shame ‘cause these drugs are good for nothing but sedating irate elephants, not curing psychiatric disease.

According to a study published in Psychological Medicine, antipsychotic drugs cause brains to shrink – they lessen brain matter and volume. Originally designed for those deemed “schizophrenic,” the drug companies came up with a brilliant marketing campaign to sell these drugs to a much wider market—unsatisfied antidepressant users. You’ve probably seen the ads—if your “depression medication” isn’t working, then don’t blame the drug; you may just have bipolar disorder!

Once swallowed, antipsychotics sail through the blood stream where they’re carried to the brain. Like a giant oil spill, antipsychotics cover the brain in a medicinal slick, where brain wave transmission is blocked. Users become devoid of normal brain activity. Motivation, drive and feelings of reward are shunted. If psychiatry considers this a “treatment,” they’re the crazy ones.

If you’ve ever seen someone who has suffered from the “spill” courtesy of following doctors orders, you can’t mistake one of the most common side effects, it’s called Akathisia. Involuntary movements, tics, jerks in the face and the entire body can become permanent side effects for antipsychotic users.

Antipsychotics also cause obesity, diabetes, stroke, cardiac events, respiratory problems, delusional thinking and psychosis. Drug regulators from the U.S., Canada, United Kingdom, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa warn that they can also lead to death. I wouldn’t be surprised if psychiatrists considered this a cure…

Use This to Jump The Grand Canyon

If you’re going to attempt to jump your scooter over the Grand Canyon, or ride your snowboard off Kilimanjaro, stimulants are great. They flood the brain with dopamine and trigger an inhuman surge of adrenaline, responsible for making you believe life is grand, despite eminent death. Outside of that, you’re either a speed freak, a college student trying to learn an entire semester of Biology 101 in 4 hours, or a fifth grader “following doctor’s orders.”

Top stimulants being prescribed today are nothing more than a mix of amphetamines packaged into trade names like Adderall, Dexedrine and Ritalin.  Street thugs sell it as meth, poor man’s cocaine, crystal, ice, glass and speed. It’s no wonder kids are now abusing Ritalin, Adderall and these drugs more than street drugs, they’re cheaper to get and they’re “legal,” hence the term kiddie cocaine.

Even the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) categorizes Ritalin in the Schedule ll category, meaning a high potential for abuse—just like cocaine and morphine. All of them have the same effects regardless of how they’re named: Central nervous system overload leading to heart attack and/or heart failure. And kids are dropping faster than Meth Heads at Raves…

I’m not exaggerating.

Eleven international drug regulatory agencies and our own FDA has issued warnings that stimulants like Ritalin cause addiction, depression, insomnia, drug dependence, mania, psychosis, heart problems, stroke and sudden death.

Bash Your Head in with Anti-Anxiety Drugs

If you’re not man enough for a drug that could sedate an elephant like antipsychotics, then psychiatrists will prescribe anti-anxiety meds, particularly benzodiazepines. Choosing between the two is akin to deciding whether or not you should be hit in the head with an aluminum bat or a wooden one; anti-anxiety meds being the latter.

Discovered in the stinky chemistry labs of Hoffman La Roche in 1955, anti-anxiety meds aim to trigger sleep receptors in the brain, just slightly. So, rather than being riddled with anxiety, you are put to sleep, halfway. It’s “treatment,” and psychiatrists have been “practicing it for decades.” But, it has yet to work, because drugging your problems away is more dangerous than anxiety. The use of anti-anxiety meds is coupled with a host of nasty side effects such as seizures, aggression and violence once the drug wears off. Hallucinations, delusional thinking, confusion, abnormal behavior, hostility, agitation, irritability, depression and suicidal thinking are all possible outcomes according to Big Pharma’s heavily guarded research papers.

Getting off the drugs could be harder than abandoning a heroin addiction. Some have described withdrawal from “benzos” being akin to pulling hundreds of fish hooks out of their skin, without anesthesia. If you doubt their addictive nature, go to Google search and type in a few of the leading anti-anxiety drugs like Klonopin or Xanax and here is what you’ll find:

“Klonopin withdrawal” 1,860,000 results

“Xanax withdrawal” 1,980,000 results

Exposing Psychiatry: How to Get The Truth

In total, the side effects of psychiatric meds spread far and wide. And most are hidden from patients and doctors alike. Fortunately, Citizens Commission on Human Rights has solved this problem with a state-of-the-art database that allows people to search through the adverse reaction reports sent to the FDA on psychiatric drugs. It also provides international drug regulatory agency warnings and studies published on the side effects of the drugs.

So, can psychiatry help me? No. And that’s surprising because psychiatric meds are some of the biggest selling drugs, poised to seal the hopes and dreams of millions.  Regardless of what mental state I might be in (or anyone else for that matter), there is not a single drug that cures, treats or solves the perceived problems of mental health.

While people can suffer miserably from emotional or mental duress that can hinder their lifestyle, the pseudo-science of psychiatry has yet to solve any of these problems, and in fact only contributes to poor health as seen by the wide array of side effects. Marketing campaigns and ghostwritten medical journals are designed to obscure these facts. But the psychiatric drug side effect database courtesy of CCHR ensures that all patients have access to the truth, to the documented facts, which could save their life or that of a loved one.

About the Author

Shane Ellison holds a masters degree in organic chemistry and is the author of Over-The-Counter Natural Cures.  An award winning chemist, he has been quoted by USA Today, Shape, Woman’s World, as well as Women’s Health and appeared on Fox and NBC as a natural medicine advocate.  Sample his book free at www.thepeopleschemist.com

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SSRIs Render Unfriendly Skies—FOIA documents reveal what FAA failed to consider in allowing pilots on antidepressants to fly

Wednesday, July 14th, 2010

Scoop Independent News
By Evelyn Pringle
July 14, 2010

The SSRI antidepressant makers are desperate to find new customers, so they recently have been focusing on capturing groups for which the drugs were usually considered off limits. The latest marketing coup managed to open up sales to roughly 614,000 American pilots.

Under a new policy announced on April 5, 2010, pilots diagnosed with depression can seek permission from the Federal Aviation Administration to take one of four SSRIs, including Eli Lilly’s Prozac, Pfizer’s Zoloft, and Forest Laboratories’ Celexa and Lexapro.

“The FAA should reverse its ruling before it’s too late and hundreds of lives are lost when a pilot becomes impulsive, suicidal or violent–or just loses his sharpness–under the influence of antidepressant medication,” said SSRI expert, Dr Peter Breggin, in an April 19, 2010 Huffington Post commentary.

The Citizens Commission on Human Rights is also calling on the FAA to rethink allowing pilots to take SSRI in light of a new report issued last month by the National Transportation Safety Board, on a February 1, 2008 plane crash in North Carolina, by a crazy acting pilot on Zoloft, that killed all six persons on board

The report said the pilot failed to maintain control of the plane during instrument flying conditions and “deliberately descended below the minimum descent altitude.” The plane stalled and crashed while circling after an aborted landing.

“Review of the cockpit voice recorder (CVR) audio revealed that the pilot had displayed some non-professional behavior before initiating the approach,” the NTSB reported.

The CVR recorded the pilot singing: “Save my life I’m going down for the last time,” before beginning a commentary in which he told passengers: “If anybody back there believes in the good Lord, I believe now would be a good time to hit your knees.”

A review of medical records documented that “from December 4, 2006 through December 31, 2007, the pilot had filled 6 prescriptions for 30 tablets of 50 mg sertraline (Zoloft),” the report said.

The records indicated that he had been treated previously with two other antidepressant medications for “anxiety and depression” and a history of “impatience” and “compulsiveness,” the NTSB noted.

An investigation of another plane crash, resulting in two fatalities in Kingsport, Tennessee, in August 2003, found Zoloft in the blood and liver of a private flight instructor, according to an accident report by the NTSB.

In the policy statement published in the Federal Register, the FAA seems to justify the use of these drugs via the fully debunked “chemical imbalance in the brain” theory when writing: “All these medications are SSRIs, antidepressants that help restore the balance of serotonin, a naturally occurring chemical substance found in the brain.”

“Increasingly accepted and prevalently used, these four antidepressants may be used safely in appropriate cases with proper oversight and have fewer side effects than previous generations of antidepressants,” the FAA wrote, with no citation to any scientific paper to back up this assertion.

In fact, the current labels on SSRIs warn that “anxiety, agitation, panic attacks, insomnia, irritability, hostility, aggressiveness, impulsivity, akathisia (psychomotor restlessness), hypomania, and mania, have been reported in adult and pediatric patients treated for major depressive disorder as well as for other indications, both psychiatric and nonpsychiatric.”

“Even when not severe, these reactions impair judgment and increase the likelihood of accidents and violence,” according to Dr Breggin.

CCHR has set up a great website with a one-of-a-kind search engine that allows the public and officials to access the database on side effects reported to the FDA on SSRIs, and every other psychiatric drug. The site also has a search engine to access all the International warnings and studies on psychiatric drugs which have been summarized so they are easy to understand, even to a lay person.

Input Only From the Choir

On April 6, 2010, Bob Fiddaman, author of the long-running popular website and blog, “Seroxat Sufferers,” sent a request to the FAA, under the Freedom of Information Act, seeking information on the change in policy.

In the Federal Register, the FAA claims it came to its decision after “careful consideration.” However, in the 58 pages of documents sent to Fiddaman on June 9, 2010 (and kindly shared with this author), there is no mention of consultations with any of the prominent SSRI experts who may have offered a contrary view. Like Peter Breggin for instance.

The FAA’s response to Fiddaman shows the agency has been discussing the policy change since at least 2008. In response to a request for “minutes of meetings where the change in the policy was on the agenda,” as well as a list of “members present and a declaration of interests of each of the members,” the FAA sent a copy of a July 18, 2008, Memorandum, with a summary from one consultants meeting. Three outside experts attended but there were no declarations of interests, or lack thereof, by anyone at the meeting.

The summary noted that the consultants “unanimously agreed that the concept of allowing certain airmen taking antidepressant medication was reasonable and safe.” But the “unanimous consensus” was that only Prozac and Zoloft “were appropriate medications due to the longevity of their use and overall safety.”

“They also felt that only these two should be considered initially, and no other medications considered at this time,” the summary reported.

In responding to the question of whether the new policy would apply to Air Traffic Controllers, the FAA said the “new policy does not presently apply to Air Traffic Control Specialist (ATCS) because the administrative details of the monitoring and follow-up of these employees are yet to be determined. The plan is that ATCSs will eventually be included in a program of this type.”

In response to a request for any information “given to FAA from outside parties that relate to the FAA’S recent change in policy regarding pilots on antidepressant medication,” the FAA sent copies of documents received from the Aerospace Medical Association, the Airline Pilots Association Aeromedical Office, the International Airline Pilots Association, and the United States Army.

“In developing the new policy, the FAA also utilized a variety of medical research literature available in the public domain,” the response said. “We used internet sites such as, but not limited to: The National Library of Medicine PubMed site and the FDA Medwatch.”

The documents Fiddaman received show consideration of a 2003 study of aviation accidents that found SSRIs in 61 pilot fatalities between 1990-2001, in which the psychological condition and/or the drug use was determined to be the cause, or a factor in 16 of the accidents, or 31%.

However, there was no mention of a later November 2006 study titled, “Pilot Medical History and Medications Found in Post Mortem Specimens for Aviation Accidents,” led by Dennis Canfield, from the FAA’s Civil Aerospace Medical Institute, in the “Aviation, Space, and Environmental Medicine” journal.

For this study, toxicological evaluations were performed on 4,143 pilots involved in fatal aviation accidents during the period between January 1, 1993, through December 31, 2003, to identify all pilots found positive for medications used to treat cardiovascular, psychological, or neurological conditions.

The evaluations found one-hundred dead pilots with SSRIs in their systems including forty with Prozac, twenty-six with Zoloft, twenty-one with Paxil, and thirteen with Celexa.

Less than a month after the new policy was announced, in “Aviation International News,” on May 1, 2010, Matt Thurber reported that in a review of 127 accidents in the NTSB database since 1991, containing the word “antidepressant,” only three were nonfatal.

“In 124 of those accidents, 211 people were killed,” Thurber said. “In accident after accident, antidepressants … were found in the tissues of dead pilots, and the pilots had falsified their medical certificate applications to show that they had never been treated for psychiatric problems.”

Read the rest of this article here:  http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL1007/S00116.htm

Read FOIA documents here: http://fiddaman.blogspot.com/p/faa-respond-to-freedom-of-information.html

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Pfizer Makes Bank from DrugsThat Can Kill You—To say Pfizers been accused of wrongdoing is like saying BP had an oil spill

Monday, July 12th, 2010

AlterNet
By Martha Rosenberg
July 10, 2010

The drug company Pfizer is best known for Lipitor, a drug that brings cholesterol down and Viagra, a drug that brings other things up.

But the “world’s largest research-based pharmaceutical company” which sits between Goldman Sachs and Marathon Oil on the Fortune 500, is also closely associated with a seemingly never-ending series of scandals.

To say Pfizer’s been accused of wrongdoing is like saying BP had an oil spill. Other drug companies have a portfolio of products, Pfizer has a portfolio of scandals including, but not limited to, Chantix, Lipitor, Viagra, Geodon, Trovan, Bextra, Celebrex, Lyrica, Zoloft, Halcion and drugs for osteoarthritis, Parkinson’s disease, kidney transplants and leukemia.

During one week in June Pfizer 1) agreed to pull its 10-year-old leukemia drug Mylotarg from the market because it caused more, not less patient deaths 2) Suspended pediatric trials of Geodon two months after the FDA said children were being overdosed 3) Suspended trials of tanezumab, an osteoarthritis pain drug, because patients got worse not better, some needing joint replacements (pattern, anyone?) 4) Was investigated by the House for off-label marketing of kidney transplant drug Rapamune and targeting African-Americans 5) Saw a researcher who helped established its Bextra, Celebrex and Lyrica as effective pain meds, Scott S Reuben, MD, trotted off to prison for research fraud 6) was sued by Blue Cross Blue Shield to recoup money it overpaid for Bextra and other drugs 7) received a letter from Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) requesting its whistleblower policy and 8 ) had its appeal to end lawsuits by Nigerian families who accuse it of illegal trials of the antibiotic Trovan in which 11 children died, rejected by the Supreme Court. And how was your week?

Nor does Pfizer back down when faced with legal troubles.

Even as it was under the probation of a 5-year Corporate Integrity Agreement (CIA) with Health and Human Services for withholding $20 million in Lipitor rebates owed to Medicaid in 2002, it off-label marketed its seizure drug Neurontin and entered into another CIA in 2004.

Read entire article:  http://www.alternet.org/story/147467/

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Prescription Pill-Popping By Far a Leading Killer as Florida’s Drug Deaths Spike 20%

Thursday, July 1st, 2010

FlaglerLive.Com
July 1, 2010

Oxycodone, the addictive prescription pain-killer also known by its Purdue Pharma brand name OxyContin, directly caused more deaths in Florida in 2009 than cocaine, heroin and morphine combined. Prescription drugs as a whole are killing far more Floridians than illegal drugs, with some 8,600 deaths last year involving at least one prescription drug, according to an annual report released today by the Florida Medical Examiners Commission.

That’s 5 percent of all deaths in Florida in 2009, when 171,300 people died in the state.

The number of people killed by prescription drugs is a significant 20 percent increase over last year’s 6,200 deaths attributed to overdoses. Much of the increase is due to a spike in oxycodone addiction. The increase in prescription-drug addiction continues a trend that began in Florida 10 years ago, when prescription drugs overtook illegal drugs as leading causes of drug-related deaths.

Alcohol is also included in the examiners’ analysis, and it leads the way of all drug-related deaths, with 4,046.

The annual report is a stark look at the effects of legalized drug addiction and over-prescription of drugs, both of which affect a far larger segment of the population than recreational or illegal narcotics.

For the first time in 2009, the commission tracked deaths by region. In Flagler County’s district, which includes St. Johns and Putnam counties, 22 deaths were attributed to oxycodone (the fourth lowest number in the state’s 23 districts), with 13 of those deaths directly attributed to the drug, and nine cited as being present among other drugs that contributed to death.

Hydrocodone claimed 16 lives in the district. Cocaine contributed to 19 deaths in the Flagler district, though only four cases were directly attributed to the drug. In 15 cases, cocaine was present in the body in conjunction with other drugs that proved lethal. Overall in Florida, cocaine-related deaths (including the majority of cases where cocaine wasn’t directly the factor but was present in the body at the time of death), have fallen from a peak of 2,179 in 2007 to 1,462 in 2009. (Again, cocaine was the direct result of death in 529 cases out of those).

Ken Kramer, a researcher with the Citizens Commission on Human Rights of Florida, says the numbers underestimate the extent of the problem, because medical examiners do not track deaths attributed to antipsychotic drugs or to antidepressants, both of which carry black-box or black-label warnings. The warnings on antidepressants, required by the Food and Drug Administration, state that the drugs increase the risk of suicidal thinking and behavior in children, adolescents and young adults up to age 24. (Antidepressants include Paxil, Prozac, Zoloft, Effexor, Lexapro and Celexa.)

Anti-psychotic drugs carry a variety of black label warnings of increased mortality in elderly patients (including a death rate almost twice as high for people taking Risperdal, for example). Those drugs, prescribed and often overprescribed in nursing homes and assisted living facilities, include Abilify, Clozaril, Geodon, Risperdal, Seroquel and Zyprexa.

“Certainly, the actual number of prescription drug deaths is higher than the annual report states,” Kramer said. “It is unknown just how much higher because the Medical Examiners Commission does not track these classes of drugs.”

Two years ago Kramer got his concern heard by the commission following an email exchange with a commissioner in which he argued that antidepressants and anti-psychotic drugs’ contributions to mortality should be part of the annual report. He was rebuffed. One examiner vsaid he had not seen “more than the occasional death caused by these types of drugs,” according to the minutes of the Aug. 13, 2008 meeting of the commission.

Read entire article:  http://flaglerlive.com/7256/florida-prescription-drugs-deaths-oxycontin-oxycodone

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The FAA better rethink allowing pilots to take antidepressants; New report says pilot in 2008 plane crash was on Zoloft

Wednesday, June 30th, 2010

Comment from CCHR Int:
A few months ago, the FAA changed its rules and now allows pilots to fly planes under the influence of antidepressants (drugs documented to cause mania, psychosis, worsening depression, hallucinations, suicidal and even homicidal ideation—see this link for international studies and warnings http://www.cchrint.org/psychdrugdangers/ ). Now a new report has just been released on the 2008 Mount Airy plane crash, and toxicology tests reveal the pilot had the antidepressant Zoloft in his system. Now pay attention to this particular line of the report, “Officials say the pilot ‘displayed non-professional behavior’ and that a cockpit voice recording showed that he began singing, [yes singing] “Save my life, I’m going down for the last time.”

And this, “The NTSB [National Transportation Safety Board] says the pilot failed to maintain control of the plane during instrument flying and deliberately went below the minimum descent altitude.” Deliberately. Now look again at the documented side effects of these drugs cited above or see for yourself in the link to the psychiatric drug database. The FAA needs to reverse its ruling.

News 14 Carolina
June 30, 2010

The National Transportation Safety Board issued a report on the probably cause of a 2008 plane crash in Mount Airy that killed everyone on board. The plane stalled and crashed while circling after an aborted landing.

The NTSB says the pilot failed to maintain control of the plane during instrument flying conditions and deliberately went below the minimum descent altitude.

Officials say the pilot “displayed non-professional behavior” and that a cockpit voice recording showed that he began singing, “Save my life, I’m going down for the last time” after being cleared for approach.

Toxicology tests revealed that the pilot had the drug Zoloft in his system, and medical records revealed he had been treated for anxiety and depression. The report also said it’s not clear whether the medical conditions could account for the behavior or whether they contributed to the accident.

Read entire article:  http://charlotte.news14.com/content/local_news/triad/627644/ntsb-releases-report-on-2008-mount-airy-plane-crash

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Public reports reveal psychiatric drugs linked to 64% of all suicides in Sweden

Tuesday, June 29th, 2010

Public reports reveal psychiatric drugs linked to 64% of all suicides in Sweden

The One Click Group
By Janne Larsson
June 29, 2010

This unique report presents data about the preceding psychiatric drug treatment for all persons who committed suicide in Sweden 2007. The conclusion is that a large percentage of the persons who committed suicide had received extensive treatment with psychiatric drugs within a year of and close to the suicide.
Public reports reveal psychiatric drugs linked to 64% of all suicides in Sweden.

This is a report about suicides committed in Sweden (with around 9 million citizens) in 2007 and the psychiatric drug treatment that preceded these suicides.

The report has three main parts:

• It gives unique data about all suicides committed in 2007 and the psychiatric drugs that the persons received within a year of the suicide.

• It compares these data with autopsy reports about psychiatric drugs found in the blood (of 98%) of all the persons who committed suicide in 2007.

• It gives extensive information about the psychiatric drug treatment given within a year to the subgroup of persons who committed suicide in 2007 and then were reported to the National Board of Health and Welfare by reason of law 3 – one third of all suicides committed that year.

The data presented on these pages should have been published by the responsible national authorities.

A large percentage of the persons who committed suicide in Sweden in 2007 had received extensive treatment with psychiatric drugs within a year of their suicide.

The idea that persons who are depressed are suffering from “chemical imbalances” and are deficient in the substance serotonin has been marketed by the pharmaceutical companies selling antidepressants (in the class of antidepressant drugs called Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors, SSRIs, such as Prozac, Paxil/Seroxat, Zoloft) for more than a decade. The intensive marketing has led persons to believe that their low mood is a deficiency disease – and that it is vital to supply the substance that corrects this deficiency – the antidepressant drug.

But there is no scientific evidence that a low mood is caused by a ”chemical imbalance” in the brain. The hypothesis has been rejected with the following words by one of the most well known names in the field, Dr. David Healy,“The serotonin theory of depression is comparable to the masturbatory theory of insanity.”

The Swedish medical agencies and their psychiatric consultants have used old data from forensic toxicological screenings to mislead the public and to heavily increase the use of antidepressants and other psychiatric drugs.

The most important information in this area is the patients’ medical history; the treatment history. Antidepressants, neuroleptics and other psychiatric drugs may cause harmful changes in the brain and these brain dysfunctions do not vanish when the drugs are discontinued – in many cases they cause chronic dysfunction to the brain, exemplified by the known neurological harm caused by neuroleptics. Many patients also get serious withdrawal reactions; reactions that can be so severe that they can lead to suicide.

Better sources of information are the unpublished clinical trials of psychiatric drugs done by pharmaceutical companies, and the important studies done by independent researchers. A number of these studies show that antidepressants and neuroleptics increase the risk of suicidal behaviour and directly cause effects that lead to suicide.

Download and read the full report here; http://www.theoneclickgroup.co.uk/documents/ME-CFS_docs/Psychiatric%20Drugs%20&%20Suicide,%20Sweden%202007.pdf

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Psychiatry & the United States of Affliction: Are You Normal or Finally Diagnosed?

Wednesday, June 9th, 2010

The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders is a list that can be abused to the detriment of patients and benefit of drug companies.

Miller-McCune
By Arnie Cooper
June 8, 2010

“My dear Sir, take any road, you can’t go amiss. The whole state is one vast insane asylum.” — James L. Petigru

Spend just a few minutes watching prime time television with its endless pageant of commercials for antidepressants and anti-anxiety meds and you start to wonder if USA really means the United States of Affliction.

Such “direct to consumer” drug advertising ties into one of the most far-reaching criticisms in revising the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders: the potential to transform normal human behavior into a mental disorder.

This issue didn’t arise with the ongoing revision of the DMS-V. It’s long been a concern for psychiatry, which must exist uneasily alongside pharmaceutical companies’ hopes of expanding their markets and Americans’ desire for take-a-pill quick fixes. But past experiences suggest new diagnoses will reap a harvest of not fully intended consequences of patients larded with labels — and prescriptions.

Christopher Lane, an intellectual historian who has written extensively on psychiatry and culture, detailed the inclusion of “social anxiety disorder” in the DSM-III in his 2007 book, Shyness: How Normal Behavior Became a Sickness.

Lane revealed how the 15-member DSM-III task force, in its quest to establish psychiatry as a legitimate science (and riding the wave of drug companies looking to expand their markets for anti-psychotics and tranquilizers), spit out “almost over night” various new disorders, including one for those uncomfortable with social situations.

No longer need shyness be a variant of normal. Now it can be a neurochemical disorder addressable with GlaxoSmithKline’s multibillion-dollar marvel Paxil. Before safety concerns and patent expirations raised their ugly heads, antidepressants had become the second-largest selling class of drugs in the United States.

“In this desire to biologize and medicalize, with the idea that every personal crisis or problem is due to a disorder of the brain, we’ve lost sight of the vast complexity of behavioral responses to external stresses,” Lane says. Add to that some possibly dangerous side effects. Along with Prozac and Zoloft, Paxil was found to increase thoughts of suicide, especially among teens, prompting an FDA warning in 2004.

Read entire article:  http://www.miller-mccune.com/health/are-you-normal-or-finally-diagnosed-17073/

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The Huffington Post: “Pilots Taking Antidepressants? The FAA Is Risking Our Lives”

Monday, April 19th, 2010

The Huffington Post
By Peter Breggin
April 19, 2010

A few years ago I was hired by the FAA to defend the agency against a suit brought by a pilot who wanted to fly while taking a prescription antidepressant. I helped the FAA formulate its defense of the agency’s ban on pilots using antidepressants and, as a result, the ban remained in effect. Pilots remained unable to fly while taking antidepressants, including the newer ones such as Prozac, Paxil, Zoloft, Celexa, Lexapro and Effexor.

How times have changed. Ignoring the scientific data on adverse drug effects that the agency and I generated and evaluated for the earlier case, the FAA is lifting its 70-year-old ban on allowing pilots to take antidepressants. Has the science changed–improving the adverse reaction profile of these drugs? To the contrary, since that time my most dire observations have been confirmed in the FDA-approved label for all antidepressants. Now there is not only a Black Box Warning for suicidality in children, youth and young adults, but also a lengthy Warnings section about a variety of extremely dangerous abnormal behavioral reactions in all ages including aggression, hostility, disinhibition, impulsivity and mania. Even when not severe, these reactions impair judgment and increase the likelihood of accidents and violence.

According to the FDA-approved guidelines, prescribers are supposed to give a special Medication Guide to patients and their families that warns about dangerous drug-induced reactions including suicide, violence and a variety of unexpected negative behaviors. Originally intended for children and youth, the Medication Guide is now expanded to cover all age groups, including adults. The Medication Guide for all ages can be found at the conclusion of each FDA-approved label for antidepressant drugs in the 2010 Physicians’ Desk Reference.

Why did the FAA lift the ban on pilots using antidepressants? According to FAA statements to the media, depressed pilots sometimes kept on flying while secretly taking antidepressants. “Our concern is that they haven’t necessarily been candid,” FAA Administrator Randy Babbitt reportedly told the press on a conference call. They were flying below the radar of drug testing, so to speak. The new policy not only allows pilots to use antidepressants, it grants a degree of amnesty to those who have been using them illegally in the past.

The FAA feels it’s safer to allow the use of antidepressants because it will make it easier for pilots to obtain needed treatment for depression. It supposedly will also make it easier to monitor their use of these dangerous drugs. If we accept this argument, why not legalize stimulants such as amphetamine as well? They would help keep the overworked pilots awake. And while the FAA is at it, why not let them use marijuana, since they may be doing it illegally on their own without anyone monitoring them.

Unfortunately, monitoring pilots on antidepressants won’t work nearly as well as might be hoped. Many severe emotional and behavioral reactions occur in the first one to three days of antidepressant dosing, or shortly after dose changes, either up or down–long before the next scheduled appointment. Although close monitoring and informing the family to be on the alert can be helpful, and should be done, it won’t prevent many of the drug reactions that occur abruptly and without warning. In addition, doctors too often fail to warn the patient and the family about the risks. As a medical expert, I’ve learned how cavalier some prescribers are in regard to warning patients about the adverse effects of any psychiatric drugs.

Read entire article:  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-peter-breggin/antidepressants-pilots-ta_b_542240.html

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The FAA will Allow Antidepressant Popping Pilots and their Lethal Side Effects in an Unfriendly Sky

Monday, April 5th, 2010

PR-inside.com
April 5, 2010

Ever wonder, which government agency would be most likely to put a person in harms way. If you join the military then you volunteer to be placed in the line of fire if under enemy attack. The antidepressant use can also kill you on the base just like it did at Ft. Hood several months ago. The IRS will use fear instead of mortality, but they can certainly incarcerate you which could be a slow death. The FDA has been approving psychotropic drugs, heart medications, birth control pills et al, with horrendous track records and mortal consequences since its inception. Some of those drugs have been taken off the market, but most like antidepressants are still available even though it is widely known they depress patients. Now we have the latest US government agency the FAA, which will now allow pilots to medicate and fly.

Some of the side effects of these now allowable medications (Prozac, Zoloft, Celexa, Lexapro) are suicide, mania, agitation, dizziness, fatigue, insomnia, tremors, muscle aches, diarrhea, fast heartbeat, fever chills, fainting, bizarre behavior, aggressiveness, joint or wrist aches and pain, ringing in the ears, confusion, decreased concentration, decreased coordination, exaggerated feeling of well being, irritability, hostility, memory loss, vomiting, mood changes, unusual weakness, vision changes, hallucinations, and worsening of depression. Do you feel safe to fly in a tin can at 35,000 feet when the pilot may have one or more of these side effects? It seems clear the FAA is looking at only one head in the head count. Based on these side effects you could have a maniac flying the plane! You should get thrown off the plane for bizarre behavior, but today you get to be the captain.

Read entire article:  http://www.pr-inside.com/the-faa-will-allow-antidepressant-popping-r1813445.htm

Click here for a related video:  http://www.newsy.com/videos/pilots-on-antidepressants-permitted-to-fly

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