Replies to '09/28 Overmedicating America: The Cruise Controversy'

OK, want the facts? The SSRIs are known to cause suicidality. These drugs can induce people to do things they wouldn't normally do, have thoughts they wouldn't normally have. It does not limit itself to causing worsened suicidality or worsened depression in previously depressed or suicidal patients, or patients at risk for becoming depressed. These drugs can cause depression, cause suicidality, cause mania, cause anxiety, even when it would never have existed before. The suicidality is at least twice as high in the drugged patients as in the placebo patients in clinical trials. 

The brain scans scam is totally flawed. They take brain scans of people and assume that the lowered activity is evidence of a chemical imbalance when it might be simply because the person isn't using that part of their brain. It's a lot like if you take a heat imaging scan of a sleeping person and compare it to one of a person exercising vigorously. Having lots of  happy emotions will stimulate the brain in some areas that aren't stimulated when a person is more mellow. 

Similarly, when muscles get exercised the blood flows to them more vigorously. 

There isn't enough data on brain scans to show any real evidence of a normal brain, a happy brain, a depressed brain, and even as this field develops that does not mean you can prove a mental illness or state of mind exists because of a brain scan. If that were the case, then why not just scan the whole population for a "criminal" brain and go ahead and give them anti-crime drugs to keep them under control? 

See The Antidepressant Fact Book. 

Similarly, assuming that a drug corrects a chemical imbalance is based on backwards logic. Yes, the drugs do something to the brain. But is what they do a correction of a chemical imbalance? The "science" assumes that if the drug has an effect of improving positive emotions or reducing negative ones, that must be because of a chemical imbalance that the drug corrected. But it is more evident that a placebo effect is taking place. See my previous posts or The Antidepressant Fact Book or www dot breggin dot com 

Furthermore, how would you explain the cases of people who were prescribed SSRIs for test anxiety or insomnia or migraines, who committed suicide or showed increased suicidal ideation? And why would drug companies admit that the dose adjustment phase is the most dangerous for this worsening of symptoms or emergence of new ones? How do you explain the fact that every time I increased my dose of Zoloft I experienced worsening violent ideations? Was it my underlying anxiety disorder? My thyroiditis? My panic symptoms? I think not. When I went to the doctor for help I was extremely happy but also very worried about my baby because he had had 2 ER visits within 24 hours of coming home from being born. I had a panic attack. But I had started to feel better. Despite this my doctor gave me zoloft. Immediately I began feeling detached, blunted, manic, and within 3 days suicidal out of fear of hurting my son. As I increased my dose, each time I went up, the symptoms got worse. Bad thoughts plagued me for months, and I was in a fog. When I finally went off of Zoloft, against doctor advice, I had symptoms like feeling jittery and more anxious and worried, but as soon as I finished the drug and had a little time to recover, I felt like I had my old personality back. I went from disturbed to undisturbed directly from stopping Zoloft. Was that because I had corrected my chemical imbalance and no longer needed Zoloft? or was it because I removed a foreign, harmful substance from my brain and body? Please try and reconcile this, and the cases of non-depressed patients who become suicidal on these meds, with your statements. 

The numbers on the tables I saw during the presentation I recently attended showed effect sizes of increasing suicidality for different drugs and for improvement on the drugs. Effectiveness was listed in the 0.5 range, and suicidality ranged from like 39 to more than 50. 

Research published on the effect of suicidality is often hidden in many ways, either the incidences get excluded, or lumped into the category of depression. These are the FACTS obtained FROM DRUG COMPANIES (in trial preparation). 

If you honestly think that everyone prescribed an SSRI gets it for depression you are mistaken. It is prescribed for things like PMS, PMDD, OCD, migraines, blood pressure control, insomnia, test anxiety, anxiety, etc. 

Also, if you haven't noticed it by now, I refer several times in my posts to references of SSRIs being similar to street drugs like cocaine, meth, LSD and PCP. If you don't believe me I can go look up the study on serotonin syndrome which categorizes drugs by their action on the brain and post it here. 

It seems that you really have a lot of sadly misinformed views that really need to be corrected.