Tag Archives: military suicides

Psychiatric Drugs and War: A Suicide Mission

The first in a four-part series by investigative journalist Kelly Patricia O’Meara written for the Citizens Commission on Human Rights (CCHR) a psychiatric watchdog organization. The series will explore the epidemic of suicides in the military and the correlation to dramatic increases in psychiatric drug prescriptions to treat the emotional scars of battle. The first installment looks at the statistical data, military suicides and unexplained deaths among the troops tied to prescription drugs.

Boom in Suicides—Government Addresses Suicides Without Looking at Suicide-Linked Drugs

It would be laughable if it weren’t tragic. This week Surgeon General Regina Benjamin introduced a plan to stem the nation’s growing suicide rate without addressing the nation’s growing use of suicide-linked drugs.

Antidepressants like Prozac and Paxil, antipsychotics like Seroquel and Zyprexa and anti-seizure drugs like Lyrica and Neurontin are all linked to suicide in published reports and in FDA warnings. (Almost 5,000 newspaper reports link antidepressants to suicide, homicide and bizarre behavior.) Asthma drugs like Singulair, antismoking drugs like Chantix, acne drugs like Accutane and the still-in-use malaria drug Lariam, are also linked to suicide.

US Soldiers’ Suicides Caused by Prescription Drugs?

Over 4,000 published reports of violent and bizarre behavior of people affected by antidepressants on the Web archive ssristories.com reveal the same out-of-character violence and self-harm in civilians that is currently seen in the military. Twenty people set themselves on fire. Ten bit their victims (including a biter who was sleepwalking and a woman, on Prozac, who bit her 87-year-old mother into a critical condition.) Three men in the 70s and 80s attacked their wives with hammers. Many stabbed their victims obsessively—one even stabbed furniture after killing his wife—and 14 parents drowned their children, a crime seldom heard of before the 2001 Andrea Yates case. Yates, who drowned her five children, was on the antidepressant Effexor, which manufacturer Wyeth (now Pfizer) “issued no public warning” about [the possibility of violent behavior], says the Associated Press.

Are Soldiers Suicides Caused by Prescription Drugs?—At Fort Brag 4,994 troops on antidepressants/664 on antipsychotics

The suicide rate among troops is astonishing. In 2009 there were 160 active duty suicides, 239 suicides within the total Army including the Reserves, 146 active duty deaths from drug overdoses and high risk behavior and 1,713 suicide attempts, says the Army’s suicide report, released in July. Not only are more troops dying from their own hand than combat says the Army report, titled Health Promotion, Risk Reduction, Suicide Prevention, 36 percent of the suicides were troops who were never deployed. Also astonishing is the psychoactive drug rate among active duty-aged troops, 18 to 34, which is up 85 percent since 2003 according to the military health plan, Tricare. Since 2001, 73,103 prescriptions for Zoloft have been dispensed, 38,199 for Prozac, 17,830 for Paxil and 12,047 for Cymbalta says Tricare 2009 data, which includes family prescriptions. All of the drugs carry a suicide warning label.

Freedom of Information Act request made to Pentagon officials regarding alarming drug overdoses in our armed forces

Prescription drug cocktails have lead to at least 32 accidental overdoses among Marines and soldiers since 2007, bringing military medical practices for treating physical and psychiatric problems under scrutiny. Most of the troops had been prescribed “drug cocktails,” combinations of drugs including painkillers, sleeping pills, antidepressants and anti-anxiety drugs, interviews and records show. In all cases, suicide was ruled out.