FDA warning on SSRIs

[Anonymous]

Freud basically made up most of his research any way.

For example, he decided one woman had a neurosis that could be cured by, of all things, surgery on her nasal cavities done by one of his good friends.

The friend did the surgery, but left a giant piece of gauze inside the woman's nose.

The woman's symptoms were then dismissed as "hysteria" until massive bleeding lead them to investigate and the gauze was found.

After this, Freud *still* believed that the symptoms, even the bleeding, were hysteria.

The man was a genius, but completely unethical, completely unscientific and took American psychiatry on a ridiculous detour from which it has yet to recover.

I haven't even mentioned the invention of "repressed memories" which sent hundreds of innocent people to jail and broke up thousands of families.

Further, how could you evolve an unconscious that has the properties of Freud's unconscious, for example, properties that make trains run late so you miss the first five minutes of your shrink appointment due to "resistance."?

it's all voodoo.

[Deborah]

Letter to the Editor re Andrea Yates:

How shocked and troubled we all are at the June 20th killing of her five children by Houston's Andrea Yates. We struggle to make sense of such
horrible tragedy, and we read reporters' attempts to do the same. I do not know this woman or her situation, and I have no easy answers. But as a psychologist, I have observed a pattern emergent in the large majority of these incidents of so-called senseless violence. Many others and I are
convinced that this pattern reveals a key factor that has been largely missed or ignored by the press. First, four indisputable facts:

!) There has been a dramatic increase in the use of psychiatric drugs in the last 20 years.

2) Research has clearly documented the connection between violence and suicide and psychiatric drugs. This connection is especially strong for
drugs intended to raise serotonin levels such as the family of antidepressants called selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), such as Prozac, Paxil, Seroxat and Luvox, as well as for newer antidepressants like Effexor and many others.

3) A high percentage of the perpetrators of violent killings, both suicidal and homicidal, in the last 15 years committed their awful acts under the direct effects of mind-altering psychotropic drugs, legally prescribed by their doctors for depression or other alleged "mental
illnesses."

Andrea Yates is the latest in a long line of tragedies in which psychiatric drugs are implicated. The courts are even beginning to
take action; witness the recent $8 million settlement against the makers of Paxil awarded to the family of Donald Schell, a Wyoming man who killed his wife, daughter, granddaughter and himself while under the influence of that drug.

Texans For Safe Education, a citizens group of which I am founding director, is expressly concerned with the ever-increasing role of psychiatry in the schools, has school violence as one of its main concerns. We have witnessed this link in most of the recent cases of dramatic school shootings; examples just since 1998 are Kip Kinkel in Oregon, Eric Harris in Colorado, Steven Abrams in California, and most recently, Jason Hoffman in California.

4) These drugs are dangerous for many reasons. Ann Tracy systematically details these dangers, of these drugs. To provide just one example, in a
1999 addendum to her book, Prozac: Panacea or Pandora, she reports that the latest FDA figures show Prozac has about 44,000 adverse reports,
including 2500 deaths with the large majority of them linked to suicide or violence.

Here is a quick course in how these drugs can cause such ugly violence.

1) Humans are made with a built-in fight or flight response, triggered by release of cortisol. These so-called antidepressants trigger a release of cortisol, and it becomes a matter of time before a parasympathetic (or shutting down of arousal for recovery purposes) response kicks in. If such a compensatory response is not allowed, we will inevitably experience system/organ exhaustion and breakdown. The overall hell state of agitation that goes with fight or flight, toxicity and depletion leads
to hopelessness and desperation

Blocking uptake of 5ht serotonin, the molecule affected by these drugs, actually decreases metabolized serotonin, creating the very deficiency supposedly treated. Everybody responds differently according to their unique physiological pattern, but it is bound to be a mess sooner or later. Disruption of sleep, and rapid eye movement (REM) activity in
particular, is a major contributor to this.

The effects of these drugs is like LSD in the sense that it messes with these central nervous system neurotransmitters, and that creates the
altered states of consciousness in which inner or outer visions are confused with "objective" reality. Psychiatry calls this hallucination
and psychosis. Acted out, society calls it murder or suicide.

Why is this information suppressed by psychiatry and the drug manufacturers? That has to do with money, greed, and power.

John Breeding, PhD
Psychologist and Director,
Texans For Safe Education
2503 Douglas St.
Austin. TX 78741
(512) 326-8326

[Antigen]

On 2003-11-21 06:36:00, Anonymous wrote:

"Ginger---if any of that sounded like it was directed at you, it wasn't.  You are showing your usual very good sense, IMO."

Well thank you. No, I didn't think any of it was. I just think ya'll are fighting eachother needlessly. You're all right. Nobody's wrong here.

The function of the press is very high. It is almost holy. It ought to
serve as a forum for the people, through which the people may know freely what is going on. To misstate or suppress the news is a breach of trust.
--Mr. Justice Brandeis

[Antigen]

Everybody, in your opinion, is Utah handing out more SSRIs because more people are mentally ill there? Or are more people mentally ill because they hand out more SSRIs? How can we tell?

I'm not 100% impressed with professionals, medical or otherwise. I've seen doctors say the stupidest things sometimes. For example, "Advances in medical science are 100% responsible for increases in life expectancy." In order for that to be true, it would have to also be true that advances in food production, distribution, refrigeration, education and hygene, transportation, absence of active war, lifestyle changes (the modular family), heating/cooling systems and general prosperity have had 0% effect.

You can't rely entirely on regulatory agencies like FDA, DEA or medical licensing agencies for your information. DEA says cannabis is a highly dangerous, addictive drug w/ no accepted medical uses and that Prozac is safe and effective for a broad range of maladies. I think they're wrong on both counts. It seems obvious to me that doctors are prescribing SSRIs to people for whom the risks far outweigh any benefits. That doesn't mean there are no benefits. I think it just means people put off too much personal responsibility on ppl who present themselves as professionals.

I don't have enough info right now to know whether people are going postal because of the effects of SSRIs or if people are going postal because the SSRIs are ineffective for their specific maladies. I just know people are going postal and doctors are handing out SSRIs like candy. Correlation is not causation.

In the `70s, we took LSD to make the world weird. It worked! Now the world's weird and we take Prozac to make it normal.

Anon Mom, you might be taking just the right drug for just the right reasons in just the right amounts. But, at the same time, hundreds of thousands more people are taking SSRIs than could possibly be afflicted with organic bipolar disorder.

In my view, you're doing it right. But I don't think you're explaining it exactly right. The fact that your doctor has his credentials does not make him well qualified to decide for you whether or not these drugs are right for you and your daughter. Lots of equally qualified doctors are giving bad advice. You seem to have checked his or her homework thoroughly yourself.

That's what people need to do. If everyone did that, then we wouldn't have the problems we do with idiot parents turning their mentally healthy, though angry or depressed, kids over to quack professionals who feed them psyche drugs and subject them to psyche abuse.  

"If people let government decide what foods they eat and what medicines they take, their bodies will soon be in as sorry a state as are the souls of those who live under tyranny."
Thomas Jefferson

I think o'le TJ was onto something there.

Prohibition will work great injury to the cause of temperance. It is a species of intemperance within itself, for it goes beyond the bounds of reason in that it attempts to control a man's appetite by legislation, and makes a crime out of things that are not crimes. A Prohibition law strikes a blow at the very principles upon which our government was founded.
--Rep. Robert L. Henry, TX December 22, 1914 (quoting Lincoln)

[Anonymous]

Actually, there's a number of studies correlating increased antidepressant use in a community with *decreased* suicide rates-- in both U.S. and Europe, you can find on Medline.

It certainly seems to be the case that for the vast majority of people who take antidepressants, increased suicidality is not a problem -- if it were, we'd have seen a MASSIVE inc in suicide rates in U.S. in general, but since the dramatic inc in use of these drugs, the suicide rate has been relatively flat or declining.

*however* there is clearly a minority who experience an increase in suicidal thoughts and actions.  We need more data to know who these people are, but it's pretty obvious that there should be some more monitoring when people first start these drugs and they should be warned about possible danger signs

Re:  Utah.  Utah has Mormons who don't allow any psychoactive drug use including caffeine and alcohol.  Clearly, they are allowing antidepressants, so maybe this is kind of taking up for the decreased use of other psychoactive.
Or maybe Utah itself is just depressing.

Also, given the huge "troubled teen" industry in the state, the increased suicides there may have more to do with that than with Prozac et al.-- either because they are making kids worse or because the kids sent there are already troubled, have high rates of use of these drugs as well and/or both.  I understand there was a similar excess of suicides in Florida where the Straights operated.

Re:  LSD and Prozac.  This is completely silly.  they both affect the same neurotransmitter, sure, but in widely digressing ways.  It's kind of like saying all food is the same because it activates the taste bud receptors.  

Further, there's evidence that depression shrinks the hippocampus (brain area involved in memory, amongst other thngs) and that all effective antidepressants from Prozac to cognitive-behavioral therapy promote growth in this area.

[Anonymous]

On 2003-11-21 07:50:00, Deborah wrote:

"Letter to the Editor re Andrea Yates:



How shocked and troubled we all are at the June 20th killing of her five children by Houston's Andrea Yates. We struggle to make sense of such

horrible tragedy, and we read reporters' attempts to do the same. I do not know this woman or her situation, and I have no easy answers. But as a psychologist, I have observed a pattern emergent in the large majority of these incidents of so-called senseless violence. Many others and I are

convinced that this pattern reveals a key factor that has been largely missed or ignored by the press. First, four indisputable facts:



!) There has been a dramatic increase in the use of psychiatric drugs in the last 20 years.



2) Research has clearly documented the connection between violence and suicide and psychiatric drugs. This connection is especially strong for

drugs intended to raise serotonin levels such as the family of antidepressants called selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), such as Prozac, Paxil, Seroxat and Luvox, as well as for newer antidepressants like Effexor and many others.



3) A high percentage of the perpetrators of violent killings, both suicidal and homicidal, in the last 15 years committed their awful acts under the direct effects of mind-altering psychotropic drugs, legally prescribed by their doctors for depression or other alleged "mental

illnesses."



Andrea Yates is the latest in a long line of tragedies in which psychiatric drugs are implicated. The courts are even beginning to

take action; witness the recent $8 million settlement against the makers of Paxil awarded to the family of Donald Schell, a Wyoming man who killed his wife, daughter, granddaughter and himself while under the influence of that drug.



Texans For Safe Education, a citizens group of which I am founding director, is expressly concerned with the ever-increasing role of psychiatry in the schools, has school violence as one of its main concerns. We have witnessed this link in most of the recent cases of dramatic school shootings; examples just since 1998 are Kip Kinkel in Oregon, Eric Harris in Colorado, Steven Abrams in California, and most recently, Jason Hoffman in California.



4) These drugs are dangerous for many reasons. Ann Tracy systematically details these dangers, of these drugs. To provide just one example, in a

1999 addendum to her book, Prozac: Panacea or Pandora, she reports that the latest FDA figures show Prozac has about 44,000 adverse reports,

including 2500 deaths with the large majority of them linked to suicide or violence.



Here is a quick course in how these drugs can cause such ugly violence.



1) Humans are made with a built-in fight or flight response, triggered by release of cortisol. These so-called antidepressants trigger a release of cortisol, and it becomes a matter of time before a parasympathetic (or shutting down of arousal for recovery purposes) response kicks in. If such a compensatory response is not allowed, we will inevitably experience system/organ exhaustion and breakdown. The overall hell state of agitation that goes with fight or flight, toxicity and depletion leads

to hopelessness and desperation



Blocking uptake of 5ht serotonin, the molecule affected by these drugs, actually decreases metabolized serotonin, creating the very deficiency supposedly treated. Everybody responds differently according to their unique physiological pattern, but it is bound to be a mess sooner or later. Disruption of sleep, and rapid eye movement (REM) activity in

particular, is a major contributor to this.



The effects of these drugs is like LSD in the sense that it messes with these central nervous system neurotransmitters, and that creates the

altered states of consciousness in which inner or outer visions are confused with "objective" reality. Psychiatry calls this hallucination

and psychosis. Acted out, society calls it murder or suicide.



Why is this information suppressed by psychiatry and the drug manufacturers? That has to do with money, greed, and power.



John Breeding, PhD

Psychologist and Director,

Texans For Safe Education

2503 Douglas St.

Austin. TX 78741

(512) 326-8326





"

The guy is not an MD, and, if you notice his reference to "alleged" mental illnesses----hello?  He's as fringe as a flat earther.

[Anonymous]

On 2003-11-21 08:53:00, Antigen wrote:

"

On 2003-11-21 06:36:00, Anonymous wrote:


"Ginger---if any of that sounded like it was directed at you, it wasn't.  You are showing your usual very good sense, IMO."

Well thank you. No, I didn't think any of it was. I just think ya'll are fighting eachother needlessly. You're all right. Nobody's wrong here.

The function of the press is very high. It is almost holy. It ought to
serve as a forum for the people, through which the people may know freely what is going on. To misstate or suppress the news is a breach of trust.
--Mr. Justice Brandeis

"

Ginger, I don't dispute that a lot of doctors---frequently in fields other than psychiatry--are over-prescribing SSRI's and are ill-equipped to properly monitor those patients for adverse reactions.  That's pretty much what I'm referring to when I say SSRI's are not candy.

I just dispute the seeming allegation that SSRI's are bad chemicals that are *never* medically appropriate.

I also don't dispute that the world has *changed* and that that's one reason why a lot more people are having mental illness problems.

The following changes affect those problems:

Our water is more purified, filtering out the lithium salts that were in many people's well water as part of their natural diet which tended to stabilize those that needed it.

We live indoors under artificial light in the daytime, preventing the serotonin boost from ample sunshine we all got when we were all hunter-gatherers or subsistence farmers---and in the winter it didn't matter that we were depressed, because staying still and sleeping a lot were good ways to survive the winter.

We get less exercise, cutting off that source of natural serotonin in our systems.

We eat a lot of processed carbohydrates, which boost serotonin in fits and starts and does who knows what long term damage to the body's previously evolved ways of regulating the serotonin system.

We save the lives of the suicidal---which means they're around for us to continue to notice they're "mad"---and we have families that are less tolerant of just warehousing, usually at home, a family member who is "high strung" or "having a nervous breakdown" and letting them just be nuts.

Life expectancy has gone from the thirties to the seventies---naturally, we're noticing more of disorders that get worse as you get older---including certain mental illnesses.

Life has *changed*---whether it's "fucked up" or not is a matter of opinion, but I wouldn't necessarily argue with someone who takes that position.

Julie

[Antigen]

Here's a thought. No one can know for sure whether or not this is true, so it's a theorum at this point, not even a tryable theory.

If you start studying up on herbalism, one of the first things you notice is that an awful lot of spices and food items are medicinally and psychotropically active. Lettuce, which derives from wild dandilion, contains a certain amount of opium, among other medicinally active compounds. That class of food items have always been a food staple in European cultures, and practically unknown in African and Asian culinary culture.

Say your heritage throws back to Europe but you're born and raised for generations in America. Your ancestors would have eaten a lot of dandilion, lettuce and other popular vegitable cousins, so you'd have a small amount of opium as a regular part of your diet. So your people have developed a tolerance and dependency on this small amount of opium.

Meanwhile, the industrial revolution comes along. Everyone gives over Grandma's family recipes for prepared foods and fad diets formulated according to ever changing FDA research and recomendations. The only lettuce you ever see, if any, is the iceburg variety, which has almost no nutrients. It's specially bread for big, crisp, watery (heavy) heads. And you wouldn't even think of picking dandilions from the yard in Springtime for salads, soups and teas (like I do LOL!)  

What do you think of the possability that some of these manifestations of organic mental illness are actually the result of deficiencies, from gestation to geriatrics, in certain nutrients not present in the typical 21st Century American diet?

Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of it's victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busy-bodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those that torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0802808689/circleofmianithem' target='_new'> C.S. Lewis, God In The Dock

[Antigen]

Ok, we passed eachother. Seems asthough we already agree on just about everything. Damn! What the hell are we going to argue about?

I just dispute the seeming allegation that SSRI's are bad chemicals that are *never* medically appropriate.

I dont' think that's what Deborah is saying. Just that there are a whole lot more and more common side effects to these drugs than what FDA and the manufacturors are telling us.

Then there was an anon post or two questioning the wisdom of using SSRIs on small children. I have to admit it's worrisome to me too. There are plenty of parents (I've known and wanted badly to pimp slap a few) who do jump at every new trend in psyche drugs first before even considering that the kid might just have a high strung, pensive or otherwise unusual personality or that, horrors!, the kid might be the only sane member of the family. Based on what you've said, I don't think you're one of those. But there are a lot of them out there.

The internet interprets censorship as damage and routes around it.
--John Gilmour

_________________
Ginger Warbis ~ Antigen
American drug war P.O.W.
   10/80 - 10/82
Straight South (Sarasota, FL)
Anonymity Anonymous

[Antigen]

On 2003-11-21 05:45:00, Anonymous wrote:

Of course you are not going to believe that mental illness is caused from repressed horrible emotions.  

I think a lot of what we call mental illness is more accurately described as normal, healthy response to insane situations. But not all of it.

When I started as a federal narcotics agent, the budget that we were working with, it was less than $5 million a year, and there was only 125 agents for the entire world to work the narcotic trade that we were fighting in those days.  Times have changed.  The gluttony has grown.
--Nick Navarro, former Broward, FL Sherrif

[Deborah]

Nutrition/ Lifestyle/ Social Connectedness/  and Well Being- What's Missing

As research of indigenous cultures shows, we really are prefectly designed to be "relatively" disease free and mentally stable provided we supply ourselves the necessary ingredients.
Two good examples:
http://hypatia.ss.uci.edu/gpacs/abkhazia/people.html
http://forum.lef.org/forum16/topic23056.html

A good story re: Autism is "Son Rise" by Barry Kaufman? Required reading in many psych classes.
Professionals all over the country told them to give up. One parent was with him every waking moment. Required nothing and mimicked his every move (ie demonstrated that the external world wasn't as threatening as it felt). The child eventually came out of his protective shell, attended public school and did very well.

"A Beautiful Mind"- classic example of overcoming Schizophrenia without drugs. The movie led people to think that psych drugs made the "disease" manageable. Fact is, he quit the meds and learned to manage it on his own.
http://www.geocities.com/oppressionacti ... inder.html

Alternatives do exist. You have to look to find them.

[Deborah]

http://www.house.gov/ed_workforce/heari ... ughman.htm

On December 13, 1999, Surgeon General, David Satcher released his Report on Mental Health. In it he alleged: "Mental illness is no different than diabetes, asthma or other physical ailments?Mental illnesses are physical illnesses?We know the chemical disorders we are treating?"

In a letter of January 25, 2000, I [29] responded: "Having gone to medical school and studied?disease, then, diagnosis, you and I, and all physicians, know that the presence of any bona fide disease, like diabetes, cancer, or epilepsy is confirmed by an objective finding--a physical or chemical abnormality. No demonstrable physical or chemical abnormality: no disease! You also know, I am sure, that there is no physical or chemical abnormality to be found, in life, or at autopsy in "depression, bipolar disorder and other mental illnesses?" Why, then, are you telling the American people that "mental illnesses" are "physical" and that they are due to "chemical disorders"??Your role in this deception and victimization is clear. Whether you are a physician, so unscientific, that you cannot read their contrived, "neurobiologic" literature and see the fraud, or whether you see it and choose to be an accomplice--you should resign."

In January, 2000 Castellanos [30], summarized the state of ADHD science: "Incontrovertible evidence is still lacking?In time I?m confident we?ll confirm the case for organic causes."

On May 1, 2000, the law firm of Waters and Kraus [31] of Dallas, Texas filed the first class action suit charging that the APA, CHADD and Novartis: " planned, conspired, and colluded to create, develop, promote and confirm the diagnoses of Attention Deficit Disorder and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, in a highly successful effort to increase the market for its product Ritalin."

As of September, 2000, five or six or such class action suits had been filed, 2 in California.

It is impossible to escape the conclusion that ADD/ADHD is a total fraud leading to the medical victimization of millions of previously normal, if troubled, mis-educated, children across the United States.

It is also impossible to escape the conclusion that many departments, offices, and officials, of the federal government, are, knowingly and unknowingly, parties to this fraud and victimization.

(PROJECT TRANSPARENCY)

If you, Ladies and Gentlemen, if want to know whether ADHD, or any psychiatric ?disease? is truly a disease or not, all you have to do is pose the following question, just as I did, on September 19, to Doctors Hyman and Castellanos (or any reputable psychiatric researcher, or psychiatric organization), of the NIMH:

Is ADHD (or any psychiatric ?disease?) a bona fide disease with a confirmatory physical or chemical abnormality demonstrable within the patient? Circle ?yes? or ?no.?

(do not write in this space).

If ?yes,? cite the article which constitutes proof of the confirmatory physical or chemical abnormality, entering the following:

the author(s)..

title of the article???.

journal name??.

date??.

volume?

page numbers?..

[Deborah]

http://www.geocities.com/speakupforkids ... gkids.html

Let me clear this up right now. ADHD is not like diabetes and [the stimulant used for it] is not like insulin. Diabetes is a real medical condition that can be objectively diagnosed. ADHD is an invented label with no objective, valid means of identification. Insulin is a natural hormone produced by the body and it is essential for life. [This stimulant] is a chemically derived amphetamine-like drug that is not necessary for life. Diabetes is an insulin deficiency. Attention and behavioral problems are not a [stimulant] deficiency.¨
Dr. Mary Ann Block,
author of No More ADHD

Given their farcical empirical procedures for arriving at new disorders with their associated symptoms lists, where does the American Psychiatric Association get off claiming a scientific, research-based foundation for its diagnostic manual? This is nothing more than science by decree. They say it is science, so it is.¨
Dr. Margaret Hagen, PhD,
Professor of Psychology
Boston University

"Finally, why must the APA pretend to know more than it does? DSM IV (the fourth edition) is the fabrication upon which psychiatry seeks acceptance by medicine in general. Insiders know it is more of a political than scientific document. To its credit it says so --although its brief apologia is rarely noted. DSM-IV has become a bible and a money making best seller-its major failings notwithstanding...It is the way to get paid...The issue is what do the categories tell us? Do they in fact accurately represent the person with
the problem? They don't and can't, because there are no external validating criteria for psychiatric diagnoses. There is neither blood test nor specific anatomic lesions for any major psychiatric disorder psychiatry a hoax--as practiced today? Unfortunately the answer is mostly yes."
Dr. Loren Mosher, Psychiatrist former Chief of The
National Institute of Mental Health's Center for the Study of Schizophrenia

Research has yet to identify specific biological causes for any of these [mental] disorders. Mental disorders are classified on the basis of symptoms because there are as yet no biological markers or laboratory tests for them.¨
The U.S. Congress Office of Technology

'There has never been any criterion that psychiatric diagnoses require a demonstrated biological etiology' [cause], said Dr. Harold Pincus, vice chairperson of the DSM-IV task force. In fact, virtually no mental disorder, except those that are substance induced or due to a general medical condition, has one."
Clinical Psychiatry News

"...What they have done is medicalize many problems that don't have demonstrable, biological causes." They are a "masterpiece of political maneuvering."
Al Parides, California psychiatrist

"...modern psychiatry has yet to convincingly prove the genetic/biologic cause of any single mental illness...Patients [have] been diagnosed with 'chemical imbalances' despite the fact that no test exists to support such a claim, and... there is no real conception of what a correct chemical balance would look like. Yet conclusions such as depression is a chemical imbalance are created out of nothing more than semantics and the wishful thinking of scientist/psychiatrists and a public who will believe anything now that
has the stamp of approval of medical science.¨
David Kaisler Psychiatrist

"There's no biological imbalance. When people come to me and say, 'I have a biochemical imbalance,' I say, 'Show me your lab tests.' There are no lab tests. So what's the biochemical imbalance?"
Ron Leifer, New York Psychiatrist

"Contrary to what is often claimed, no biochemical, anatomical or functional signs have been found that reliably distinguish the brains of mental patients."
"... many are not aware of the enormous influence that the [pharmaceutical] industry has in shaping our views of mental disorders and the effectiveness of psychotherapeutic drugs.."
"I am convinced that the pharmaceutical industry spends enormous amounts of money to increase its sales and profits by influencing physicians and the pubic in ways that sometimes bend the truth and that are often not in the best interests of science or the public.
Dr. Elliot Valenstein, University of Michigan Neuroscientist
Professor Emeritus of Psychology, author of: Blaming the Brain:
The Truth about Drugs and Mental Health
Article Above From: Methylphenidate.net

[Anonymous]

For years, there was no way of testing for mental illness because the brain is very inaccessable and brain biopsy very dangerous.

Now, we have imaging technology like PET and fMRI-- and what doyou know... you *can* see differences in brains of schizophrenics, people with depression, ADD, bipolar, etc.

Too expensive and invasive for diagnostic use though-- but read the research and you'll see we're getting better and better and there is no mainstream neuroscientist who would make those arguments about "there's no test for it so it's not a disease" about mental illness any more.

Further, the idea that indigenous peoples are healthy is just not supported by evidence.  It's romantic idealization-- just not based on any actual facts.

Human lifespan has only extended via modern medicine and sanitation... smallpox, cholera, plague, Ebola, river blindness, Chagas' disease...
think about all the microbial nasties our ancestors faced.  True, they got worse when people concentrated in cities because they were able to spread faster-- but life as a hunter gatherer was nasty, brutish and short, not peaceful and disease free.

Just look at lifespans of animals in wild compared to captivity, also.

[Anonymous]

Your information on Freud is wrong,but as I said you are in the majority.  Read Freuds' paper "The Problem with psychoanalysis".  You probably have not read any of his work but all the negative work about him.   Freud himself said that no one can evaluate psychoanalysis unless they have gone through it themselves. Maybe you should try it for six months at 4 times a week and then see what you think. But you won't.