a history of dishonesty and a lack of ethical integrity

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it"

George Santayana

In my last post I compared the modern day practice of psychiatry to the eugenics movement.  I want to clarify that it is not that I believe that psychiatry is involved in some sort conspiracy to practice eugenics.  The 'mythology of chemical imbalance' and the bio-medical belief system in psychiatry and it's doctrine that mental illnesses are 'brain diseases' is and has been used to justify horrific violations of Human Rights just like 'genetic inferiority' was used as an excuse to sterilize people in public progroms during the Eugenics era.  Mental Health Public Policy is discriminatory, and legally segregates people diagnosed as mentally ill into a separate, less than equal, lower class in human society---even more so once a psychiatric diagnosis has been legally adjudicated.  Psychiatrists and other mental health professionals become treatment enforcers instead of providers and potentially have the authority to 'medically treat' and dictate where patients/victims live for the rest of their lives.  

The same flawed biased reasoning is used to justify the current Involuntary Treatment Laws that was used to justify the Eugenics Laws.   People were considered less than fully human by virtue of being determined to be 'dim-witted,' mentally ill, mentally retarded, or epileptic and were declared genetically defective, and sterilized and lobotomized in psychiatric institutions.  People were sterilized, lobotomized,  among other heinous 'medical treatments' carried out ostensibly, to benefit all of human society...

To protect society from 'those people', society determined that torture and abuse were necessary.  Legislation was passed to legally mandate these 'medical treatments.'  Ironic when one considers it.    

That there was a 'scientific basis' for the beliefs which fueled eugenic practices was 'common knowledge,' much like believers in psychiatric mythology erroneously believe that mental illness results from brain disease is a scientifically valid medical determination; when it is simply belief in a yet to be validated hypothesis.   In spite of obvious reasons for this current claim to be not only be questioned, but considered suspect; Legislation has been passed diminishing the rights of those diagnosed by psychiatry.  Involuntary Commitment Laws segregate and diminish the Individual Rights and Liberty interests of people in the exact same manner the Eugenics Laws diminished the freedom and autonomy of the people considered defective.  Proponents of the ITA Laws and the Eugenics Laws claim they are based on scientific and/or medical knowledge; yet neither were supported by valid empirical data which would validate the claims.  Apparently, as a society, we are to accept the claim that psychiatric diagnoses are diseases because some believe it to be true...no evidence is necessary, we should not need it...

We are to accept the claim because of who is making it.  Making such a claim without providing valid scientific evidence is suspect.  Doctors are not supposed to lie to or about patients.  Doctors are not supposed to lie to or mislead anyone about what is and is not known about diagnoses or treatments they provide.  Historically and presently this type of honesty has not been universally valued; scientific principles in psychiatric research and medical ethics in clinical practice have not been adhered to.  Psychiatry has abused it's authority and abused distressed patients with impunity historically.  Currently the methods of social control like coercion, being manipulative and controlling using subterfuge and denial are common in Standard Practice.  Exactly why has the ability to Court Order unwilling patients and to detain patients commonly, without Procedural Due Process of Law and Police Powers been granted to psychiatry in spite psychiatry's history of dishonesty and lack of ethical integrity? 

The Pharmacaust: The Destruction of the "Mentally Ill"

cartoon credit

I'm no ding a ling...if it walks like and talks like a duck, it must be

"PERCHANCE he for whom this bell tolls may be so ill as that he knows not it tolls for him.  And perchance I may think myself so much better than I am, as that they who are about me, and see my state, may have caused it to toll for me, and I know not that. "

John Donne

A short time ago Robert Whitaker wrote a post, that I was personally grateful he wrote.  "The Taint of Eugenics in NIMH Research Today"   I was grateful because based on my own research on history and psychiatry, and my lived experience, I had come to realize that the NIMH has focused it's efforts on finding 'proof' of genetic defect and/or biological disease in people who have symptoms of 'mental illness.'  While it very well may make good sense to look for a disease or defect; to do so at the expense of neglecting other valid areas of research, into etiology, diagnosis and treatment is not scientific, ethical or wise!  That is exactly what the NIMH has done, and Tommy Insel is continuing with his 'Stay the Course' translational neuroscience marketing agenda  in the desperate quest for the disease, or the gene that causes madness; searching for proof people with a 'mental illness' are genetically defective is the #1 priority.  

Why?  Because bio-psychiatry desperately wants to validate it's Standards of Practice used in clinical practice; particularly the standards which recommend using neuroleptic drugs as a first-line treatment for schizophrenia as an 'Evidence Based practice;' which is ludicrous---ALL the treatment algorithms, and practice parameters for using psychiatric drugs particularly the neuroleptic drugs, are not based on the evidence base, but were "standardized" by consensus---which offers protection to psychiatrists from liability claims, but offers none for patients, which is the purpose of having standards of care--to protect the patients.  In psychiatry what a Standard Practice is is an affirmative defense based on what psychiatrists do in clinical practice to "treat mental illness." Absent a show of the evidence that the standards are derived from, a reasonable person would wonder, how in the world does a treatment become a standard treatment without definitive evidence it is effective and safe? CAN a treatment be an ethical standard medical treatment absent definitive supporting evidence of it's safety and effectiveness? Evidence is a requirement for validity to be determined--do psychiatrists not understand that? I don't believe so. The psycho-pharmacological treatment first, bio-disease paradigm lacks the sort of evidence required to validate diagnoses, it lacks evidence that any particular prescription drug is an "Evidence-Based" treatment for any diagnosis; so simply mixes and matches diagnoses and drugs.

THAT is the real (potentially fatal) elephant in the room.

The evidence on neuroleptic drugs has always been substandard, which is not a big deal--unless you wish to exaggerate the drugs effectiveness while minimizing the very real life changing risks of disability and early fatality.  Psychiatry has some Standard Practices that are not therapeutic that is reality violate people's Human Rights; coercion, misleading patients and family members about what is and is not known about psychiatric diagnoses and 'treatments,' abuse of authority, are some of them. The Civil Commitment Laws in this Country mean psychiatrists in effect have, police powers when as a profession, psychiatry has been misleading patients and families, the general public, Legislatures and Courts of Law how have they earned so much "trust" without the ability to tell the truth?

Indeed, E. Fuller Torrey, the "Brain Collector," forced psychiatric treatment demagogue, and NAMI's hero psychiatrist, has been quoted in the press recommending lying to the police, and courts--why would perjury be necessary to "practice medicine?" How is open deceit, and "metaphorical" explanations of a supposed "disease" ethically ACCEPTABLE in the practice medicine? If it is the practice of Medicine, medicine has been redefined with disability and death being the "successful treatment" outcome.  It's so "effective" and desirable in fact, we legally compel people to be "treated" with drugs which more often than not, are disabling and fatal to the patient, taken as prescribed. Calling it 'necessary medical treatment' is true if early death and disability are the desired end points; because in Real World Practice, any therapeutic value to the patient, is irrelevant.

The most sickening ugly part of my experiences with psychiatry is seeing what the drugs do to a human being; not being allowed to have any say, let alone stop it.  My son was tortured; I'm a MadMother, because I witnessed the crime.  Neuroleptics are no 'first-line treatment,' a treatment of desperation, or of last resort maybe--but certainly not something to be considered safe and effective or prescribed coercing treatment compliance using fraudulent claims. The neuroleptics in truth do not "treat" so much as they alter physiological processes which may not be dysfunctional; much less, need to be altered.  Specifically, the neuroleptics alter cognition, metabolism, and cadio-vascular processes; indeed they effect the parasympathetic nervous system, which regulates all major processes in human beings. This broad spectrum effect is why neuroleptic drugs have a myriad of serious, adverse effects and fatal risks. Characterizing neuroleptic drugs as effective medical treatment in a Court of Law, or anywhere else, is a gross misrepresentation of the facts.

We are once again 'investigating' instead of STOPPING how this Nation is drugging poor children who are on Medicaid in vast numbers with drugs that have a significant risks for disability, sudden and/or early death. The leaders in the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry estimate in their Practice Parameters for Schizophrenia 50 % of the children given neuroleptic drugs will develop Tardive Dyskinesia, a neurological disorder which can be permanent and disabling; even if the neuroleptic is discontinued.  "As described above, the main symptoms of TD are continuous and random muscular movements in the tongue, mouth and face, but sometimes the limbs and trunks are affected as well. Rarely, the respiration muscles may be affected resulting in grunts and even breathing difficulties. Sometimes, the legs can be so severely affected that walking becomes difficult."

Opinions, even a whole bunch of educated opinions--are not scientific evidence.  It is 'Standard Practice' to drug people with a diagnosis of schizophrenia 'for their own good; it is not based not on empirical data, but on subjective opinions.'  This is a Standard Practice has killed more people with a diagnosis of schizophrenia than are allowed to survive, to perhaps, one day recover.  Court Orders that do not need to comply with the Rules of Evidence or Standard Legal procedures without meeting the burden of proof required in any other type of Legal proceeding. Conveniently, the FDA does not require 'adverse events' caused by FDA approved drugs be reported.  Fatalities caused by the drugs are drug induced deaths; in all reality, iatrogenic, or 'physician caused' homicide.  It is a common Real World Outcome in Standard Practice; such deaths are said to be "natural" although it is drug-induced.

It may be legal, but it is not ethical, or moral.  

It is not 'medicine.'  

It is eugenics.  

From the Director's Blog:

After a century of studying schizophrenia, the cause of the disorder remains unknown. Treatments, especially pharmacological treatments, have been in wide use for nearly half a century, yet there is little evidence that these treatments have substantially improved outcomes for most people with schizophrenia. These current unsatisfactory outcomes may change as we approach schizophrenia as a neurodevelopmental disorder with psychosis as a late, potentially preventable stage of the illness. This ‘rethinking’ of schizophrenia as a neurodevelopmental disorder, which is profoundly different from the way we have seen this illness for the past century, yields new hope for prevention and cure over the next two decades. here. 

This does this help explain the focus on early intervention. Basically, 'pre-treatment' for those targeted as being 'vulnerable' to perhaps, maybe, at some point in the future, as maybe, having a chance of experiencing psychosis. 

These services target poor children, the traumatically wounded, and the elderly; and since Alcohol and Substance Abuse was melded with Mental Health into SAMHSA, alcoholics and addicts are another demographic now targeted as well. 

nothing to see here...move along.

update from over the weekend, apparently they're a slow reader...

 bell photo credit

forget where I got the elephant it's in another post though

Parents: Are you desperate for help? Medication may be a viable course of treatment!

It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men.

Frederick Douglass

acts of commission and omission

I used to believe things that I no longer believe.  I never believed what was done to my boy was part of some kind of conspiracy or plot----It is impossible to believe my son's victimization by social workers and mental health 'professionals' and  public servants morally, ethically and legally failed their duty to my son was any sort of  'accident;' it was State sanctioned. 

What keeps me up at night is thinking of all the kids that will not be spared---because it is 'STANDARD PRACTICE' to give children teratogenic drugs which will cause them iatrogenic diseases and injuries which can disable and/or kill them---Drugs which are never 'risk free' much less, 'safe;' and all too often, not 'effective' either.   According to the GAO's report and the article below, the drugs are most often used 'off-label;' when prescribed to children, which actually means 'experimentally.' 

via Journal of Pedeiatric Health Care:

Antipsychotic Medication Prescribing Trends in Children and Adolescents

an excerpt:

"Despite the adverse effects, the FDA has approved risperidone for treatment of irritability and aggression in autistic children ages 5 to16 years and risperidone and aripiprazole for treatment of schizophrenia in children ages 13 to 17 years. More recently, four other atypical antipsychotic medications were approved for the treatment of bipolar 1 disorder and schizophrenia: quetiapine (Seroquel), olanzapine (Zyprexa), ziprasidone (Geodon), and aripiprazole (Abilify; for bipolar disorder only)."

"It is important to note that although the FDA has approved second-generation antipsychotic medications for these conditions, most pediatric use is off label, that is, prescribed for conditions not approved by the FDA (Crystal et al., 2009, Zito et al., 2008). In addition, a twofold to fivefold increase in the use of antipsychotic medications in children younger than 6 years has occurred, despite little information on their long-term effects on child health and the developing brain (Egger, 2010, Zito et al., 2000, Zito et al., 2007). Moreover, young children are likely to be receiving multiple psychotropic medications. In one large-scale analysis, almost 80% of preschool children receiving antipsychotic medications also were prescribed other psychotropic medications to manage their symptoms (Olfson, Crystal, Huang, & Gerhard, 2010). These trends, which are affecting both privately and publicly insured children of both sexes (Olfson et al., 2010, Pathak et al., 2010), pose significant implications for pediatric providers." (emphasis mine)

Taking neuroleptic drugs has 'serious implications' for the patient, particularly when the patient is a child.---This bio-psychiatric pharmaceutical 'medical treatment' is being used in Standard Practice is not derived from an evidence base.  The empirical data does not support giving children these dangerous drugs at all---Why would it be done so casually and indiscriminately   The treatment protocols written by 'experts'  are based on a consensus of opinions, not the empirical data they should be derived from!  These 'doctors' are recommending drugs for uses not safety tested or approved for the manner in which they are used----and countless children have been permanently disabled and died as a result.---I say countless because the FDA determined these 'adverse events' do not need to be tracked, the data does not need to be collected.  Doctors are not required to report adverse events like disability and death caused by FDA approved drugs---even drugs used off-label. 

One of the reasons so many children are being drugged suggested in the article is, "Inadequate Provider Time and Reimbursement for Managing Behavioral Problems"  

What the hell kind of unethical excuse is this for prescribing what are dangerous, minimally effective drugs which are potentially fatal to ANY human being; let alone a child? 

"Lack of reimbursement for the time needed to fully assess children’s problematic behaviors may put clinicians in a bind, particularly if they are faced with an overwhelmed parent desperate for help. Providers may also be concerned for the safety of the child and his or her family.  Under these circumstances, medication may be seen as a viable course of treatment."read (emphasis mine)

It is obvious to me that the members of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry want us all to believe this widespread drugging of our children is being done because kids, families, pediatricians, general practitioners, and teachers---basically anyone who is not a psychiatrist, is making it happen.  The widespread use of psychiatric drugs in children has NOTHING at all to do with the treatment algorithms and practice parameters based on a biological hypothesis, validated by the AACAP membership by a vote in the same quasi-democratic method used to develop the diagnoses and diagnostic criteria.