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Mass Psychosis In the USA?
Hugh Pickens writes "James Ridgeway writes in Al Jazeera that with over $14 billion in sales in 2008, antipsychotics have become the single top-selling therapeutic class of prescription drugs in the U.S., surpassing drugs used to treat high cholesterol and acid reflux. While once upon a time, antipsychotics were reserved for a relatively small number of patients with hard-core psychiatric diagnoses, today it seems, everyone is taking antipsychotics. 'Parents are told that their unruly kids are in fact bipolar, and in need of anti-psychotics, while old people with dementia are dosed, in large numbers, with drugs once reserved largely for schizophrenics,' writes Ridgeway. 'Americans with symptoms ranging from chronic depression to anxiety to insomnia are now being prescribed anti-psychotics at rates that seem to indicate a national mass psychosis.' By now, just about everyone knows how the drug industry works to influence the minds of American doctors, plying them with gifts, junkets, ego-tripping awards, and research funding in exchange for endorsing or prescribing the latest and most lucrative drugs. According to Marcia Angell, former editor of the New England Journal of Medicine, under the tutelage of Big Pharma, we are 'simply expanding the criteria for mental illness so that nearly everyone has one.'"
No surprise here!
That's crazy!
Aldous Huxley was spot on ...
"I love my job, but I hate talking to people like you" (Freddie Mercury)
It's a Brave New World.
Set your phasers on "funky"!
Maybe those drugs are just super expensive. A total number of consumers would be more useful.
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(I'm Amrecian)
PocketPermissions Android Permission Guide
yeah, because the US FedGov wants everyone too doped up to care about how badly they are getting fucked by the system...
infowars.com
Politics is Treachery, Religion is Brainwashing
Or it's just a case of mass over-prescription of antipsychotics. Nothing is normal anymore, EVERYONE has some kind of mental or physical disorder that must be treated by drugs.
Last year my wife was suffering from some anxiety during her pregnancy. An internal medicine doctor prescribed an anti-psychosis drug to treat bipolar disorder. The list of side effects included just about everything you wouldn't want to happen to a pregnant women. What would a drug like this do to an unborn child, let alone an adult!
When the foot seeks the place of the head, the line is crossed. Know your place. Keep your place. Be a shoe.
the popularity of Facebook and the iPhone.
Maybe those people are crazy because they're OVERmedicated? And further, because the only things the public health system will pay for on their behalf are shit? I had a county health official prescribe me a pill for respiratory function that it turned out the county health wouldn't pay for (this was a while back in my student days) even when petitioned... something that had been on the approved list just a month earlier, and something for which there was no more effective replacement.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Can't we block foreign IPs from this website? Or at least foreign IPs posting as AC?
Can we block redneck bigots from this site? Or at least start Americans with karma -1 by default?
Check out the BBC show "The Century of the Self"
http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcfour/documentaries/features/century_of_the_self.shtml
When you see that, it becomes pretty clear that the US population were unsuspecting guinea pigs in what's certainly the biggest experiment in mass psychology ever done. And that experiment FAILED.
The point is that it's evidence of overprescription, not of excessive psychotic behavior.
There is also a problem in the observations in the summary--notably, the mere fact that we are expanding our clinical definitions of psychological diagnoses is NOT a bad thing--the problem is when people treat them wrong. The good thing about expanding and re-working the definitions is that it lets you describe and identify conditions better in each generation than you did in the generation before, and maybe learn something more about how they should be best treated.
The problem is that almost nobody does real psychotherapy anymore (except for the filthy rich), so in most cases all people do is prescribe medication as if that would treat the problem. There are cases where it will, and there are more cases where it will treat the symptoms, but it often is very much the wrong approach. You can't sit down with someone and cure a psychological issue with a talking-to or folk medicine--they can be complex and very time-consuming and difficult for people to learn to live with or move past or adapt to the world in spite of--but conversations, activities, and the development of a support network in almost every case I have seen has made a bigger impact by far than the use of drugs.
-- IANAL, this isn't legal advice, and definitely isn't legal advice for you. Also, Squee!
That sounds a bit paranoid to me. Perhaps you should talk to your doctor. You could probably get drugs to help you with that.
Reality is defined by the maddest person in the room
Well, as is obvious from our ever expanding waistlines, Americans are getting less and less exercise?and probably sunlight too). I wonder if this is, at least in part, contributing to our increased depression. Several studies have shown pretty clearly that exercise is a great, if not the best, treatment for mild to moderate depression. So instead if sucking down big pharma and big agra's endless supply of shit, maybe we should try getting off our ass and going out for a run or bike ride.
Monstar L
As an non-native American (family has only been here about 7 generations) I think it's not that far a stretch to say many American's are paranoid delusional at least when it comes to foreigners. It's probably something in the water making them crazy.
We can count them and see if we reach a couple hundred million, you can be '1'.
I'm an american, and I think you're all fucking crazy, too. The strongest drug I take on any sort of regular basis is ibuprofen. I've been diagnosed with clinical depression, but I'm not taking anything for it. I was originally prescribed a couple of different things, but they had no positive effect whatsoever.
Over a decade ago, a school psychologist noticed "odd" behavior in one of my daughters. Under the guise of "vigilence", they looked for people to put on drugs. My girls, in grades 1 and 3, were interrogated -- without my permissions or knowledge -- by a school psychologist, who diagnose them with various psychotic disorders. Why? Because the girls told wild tales -- one claimed to know how to fly, and the other told dark tales ala Poe and Lovecraft.
This bitch of a psychiatrist demanded that we drug our children, and began the process of forcing us to give the girls "medicine" (i.e., anti-psychotic and ADHD drugs), even when other psychiatrists said that my daughters were fine. When asked why she was so insistent on treating my daughters for something that didn't exist, the offending psychiatrist said:
"I've been taking these drugs most of my life. I know they're good for your kids."
Needless to say, I no longer live in Colorado, where this travesty was legal. My girls are intelligent, creative, productive young adults (with lots of quirks, like any smart person). Now that they're adults, they can chose what the do and do not put in their bodies.
American society is driven by a need by people's to feel like a victim, by fear, and by selfish greed. It is a recipe for disaster.
All about me
I imagine it's pretty easy to become depressed in our society.
People who live a job rather than a life do things that advertising and media tell them to do or what other people in their situation do to escape. They turn to alcohol, nightclubs, meaningless sex*, gambling, smoking or anything that is meaningless or self destructive.
* Not that meaningless sex means anything to Slashdotters but I hope my point is made intellectually.
I imagine that these factors, plus the fact that everyone seems to be a big asshole these days contribute to people turning to drugs. Ultmately, people feel disconnected from other people, they are ostracized and bullied. Drugs don't solve problems. You do.
I feel powerless because of the following:
As Adam Smith said, agriculture is the root of all progress. Our society is unsustainable and growth seems to be on top of artificial markets. For example, digital markets like the domain market. Or on advertising.
Slashdot needs Geekcode | Can anyone recommend any good SCIFI? My tastes: Foundation, Startide Rising, CITY, Ringworld,
Ask yourself.
Why aren't you happy? You (probably) have: electricity, abundance of food and water, computers, video games, (some) free time, a job, a loving girlfriend/wife? Money?
You're not happy because you cannot be you in this society.
It's that trite cliche that materials do not bring happiness but they are necessity for happiness. You cannot be happy about something before you have shelter, food and water. (Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs)
Our society lacks somethin that people need. Drugs really don't give that to you.
Arguing about happiness on Slashdot. Very odd.
Slashdot needs Geekcode | Can anyone recommend any good SCIFI? My tastes: Foundation, Startide Rising, CITY, Ringworld,
Exactly what else did the doctor suggest you try? Counselling, Group Theory, Dietary changes? Or was it just, you go in, BANG, prescription for drugs and problem solved?
Wrong
They do something. They bind to the receptors and stuff...
They may be called "placebos" because they don't "fix" the main issue, but they certainly change the chemistry.
It's like giving ulcer medication to someone with a broken leg.
how long until
I'm a victim! It's the environment! My mom was cruel to me! Hormones make me eat too much! Video games make me violent!
All I need is some understanding. And another pill.
Or I'll kill you.
"The average reporter we talk to is 27 years old......They literally know nothing." - Ben Rhodes
I sometimes wonder if when they cure one disease they invent another. And I mean invent, not discover.
Some of our neighbors have a three year old boy. He's been diagnosed with some kidney problem I can't even remember, let alone pronounce. And yet he's perfectly healthy.
Thirty years ago, you'd have just said he needs to pee a lot.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Insomnia. It's annoying, but it's not worth losing any sleep over.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
I sometimes wonder if when they cure one disease they invent another. And I mean invent, not discover.
Some of our neighbors have a three year old boy. He's been diagnosed with some kidney problem I can't even remember, let alone pronounce. And yet he's perfectly healthy.
Thirty years ago, you'd have just said he needs to pee a lot.
Idiot. I suppose that you, from your vaunted position as a 'neighbor', can diagnose a disease condition ("some kidney problem") and immediately dismiss it because everything that medicine does is bad. Thirty years ago, someone with high blood pressure or diabetes would be ignored because there wasn't much that we could do about it. Now there is. The incidence of strokes and heart failure is decreasing - not as much as people had suggested - but it's decreasing. Thirty years ago diabetes was a death sentence. Now it's just another chronic disease. But that means that Big Pharma is milking it for all it's worth since we can't 'cure' it.
There is an amazing amount of black and white thinking here. The world is complex, people more so. Yep, big Pharma is, in part, evil. So is the Law, Medicine, Politics and McDonalds. Sometimes I think the average Slashdotter should really be locked in the basement and left there. FWIW, the Al Jezeera article was pretty lame. It conveniently ignores the fact that human behavior is one of the biggest problems that humans face and we've been trying to chemically modify it for thousands of years (think tobacco, alcohol, marijuana, opium and other 'natural' solutions) and that despite this, we don't have very good tools for doing so.
Recently, Al Jezeera has made some inroads into good journalism but every now and again, they can't help themselves and revert to type.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
TFA's headline talks about anti-psychotic medications, yet the article itself is about the entire class of psychoactive drugs.
Antipsychotics are a small sliver of the class of psycoactive drugs.
Antidepressants are psychoactive, but they are not anti-psychotic. The same applies for anti-anxiety durgs, such as Xanax, mood stabilizers for bipolar disorder (such as lithium), and for drugs used for Attention Defecit, such as ritalyn.
The problem is TFA lumps drugs used for depression and anxiety disorders in the same category as drugs used for treating schizophrenia.
In other words, the headline is misleading. Psychoactive != antipsychotic. The headline is purposefully misleading the reader into thinking that because someone takes a psychoactive drug, they are psychotic, and since americans take a lot of psychoactive drugs, Americans are psychotic.
This isn't a surprising headline for a news service whose primary audience isn't fond of Americans.
I'd expect to see the same sort of headline in a Scientologist publication.
-- Sometimes you have to turn the lights off in order to see.
The expansion of antipsychotic use has nothing to do with the number of people being diagnosed with psychotic disorders. AFAIK, that number hasn't increased much.
The real reason is that over the past 10 or 15 years, antipsychotic meds (i.e. dopamine antagonists) have been used with increasing frequency in patients who do NOT have psychotic symptoms. ("Psychotic symptoms" basically means either hallucinations or delusional thinking). Many of these meds are marketed as "mood stabilizers" for bipolar disorder-- and the criteria for bipolar disorder are so broad and so subjective that just about anyone can be diagnosed with it. Indeed, one of the popular "screening tools" for bipolar disorder is something called the Mood Disorders Questionnaire, which is a bit like those Scientology quizzes that tells you whether Scientology is right for you. (It always is). The MDQ was designed by doctors who work for drug companies-- I've met one of them.
There are three other groups who tend to get lots of antipsychotics-- the elderly (especially in nursing homes), the mentally retarded, and people with plain old depression. The last one is actually the easiest to justify, since there are some studies which suggest that certain antipsychotics can work as adjunctive treatment for depression-- they have managed to get FDA approval for that indication. The first two-- elderly and MR-- are impossible to defend. They don't benefit the patient, they cause cognitive slowing and deterioration of functioning, and they increase overall mortality. Lilly in particular has been guilty of marketing their antipsychotic (Zyprexa) to nursing homes and claiming that it improves "behavioral disturbances of dementia". It doesn't, and they eventually had to pay out billions of dollars in fines.
Any psychiatrist with half a brain knows what's going on here. In the mid 90s all the new antidepressants (Prozac, etc) started to go off-patent and the drug companies lost a major cash cow. Ever since then, the drug companies have sought new indications for dopamine blockers, since they are mostly still on-patent, and most of them are fiendishly expensive.
It's funny when you think about it. Some Americans take drugs to feel better about themselves, but non-Americans talk shit about Americans to make them feel better about themselves. Well, I guess the later is cheaper...
While of course it is a strong overstatement to say all of us Americans are insane in some way, it is true that Big Pharma and our simplistic views of life are turning us into mass consumers of psychotropic medications, legally.
In some ways, I was one of those the system tried to abuse. I say that not to inflame the argument- I know the people involved did not INTEND to do me harm. Luckily for me, I have good parents who resisted the BS. Way back in early grade school, they said I was having trouble and that I should be put on Ritalin, that I had ADD or ADHD. My mother, being smart person who can think for herself, looked at the situation and removed most of the processed sugar junk from my diet. I got sufficiently better that the matter was closed.
But wait! There's more! It turns out I am one of those unlucky few who actually was born bipolar! 35 years ago, we didn't really know these things, so I went without diagnosis, let alone treatment. And the argument still rages, can a child BE bipolar? (My case is a clear argument that, yes, a child can be bipolar).
And there's still more! Once I was properly diagnosed, by two separate, unrelated psychiatrists who were unaware of each others diagnosis (I call it the 'blind taste test method of diagnosis), I began treatment. Over a decade of trying this, that, and the other medication. You know what finally worked? Testosterone replacement therapy and vitamin-B complex, along with some mental trickery I do for myself. This is MY solution and not medical advice. But the idea is, they mostly want to sell you drugs, expensive drugs. You MUST take control and find the underlying cause for yourself! And you must be intelligent about it.
Which leads me to...
RANT ON
I don't see much hope these days. I work closely with the public and it makes me want to kill. It makes me want to remove the right to vote and breed. It makes me um... depressed... again. Americans want to blame an external source for their problems and take a magic pill to make it all better. I know this. I went through that phase of trying to find something outside of me that made me screwed up and I wanted an instant fix for it. Most Americans, it seems, don't get past that phase- ever. It's the immigrant's fault. It's my spouse's fault. It's my parent's fault. As I told an ex of mine many years ago, so the fuck what! You're an adult now. Act like one and figure your shit out; take responsibility for who you are today and make yourself better. Ask for help if need be, of course. I had to and it worked. My shrink helped me figure out the testosterone issue. She's one of the good ones.
So is Big Pharma really to blame? Or are they just capitalizing on our nature? That's a trick question. We are BOTH to blame.
RANT OFF
I apologize for the rant. This is a sore subject for me and working with the public the last several years has not helped! :) But try to imagine the conversation I have to have sometimes:
Me: I'm bipolar.
Them: Ya, so is everyone else these days.
Me: Yes, I know. It's being WAY over-diagnosed now, but I really am.
Them: Yep, they all say that too now.
If they only knew the real pain. The guilt of the pain my disease has caused others. Hell, they still wouldn't give a shit. Many of is Americans are too self-absorbed to notice. I wonder if there's a pill for that...
I hope this comment is well received... I could have moderated instead!
Persecutors will be violated!
There are a variety of anti-psychotic pharmaceuticals that can help straighten you on your keel. Talk to your doctor about Cannabidiol today.
* side effects may included drowsiness, hunger, giggling, Pink Floyd, intense focus, preoccupation with Bruce Lee, socialist leanings, belief in conspiracy theories, and enjoyment of life. If you experience any of these side effects, Cannabidiol may be just the thing for you.
First off, not all of the drugs listed are antipsychotics. Second, a lot of people need these drugs. Humans have evolved to wake up with the sun, and go to sleep not too long after sunset. Now we stay up all night. Naturally, that's going to make you a little bit crazy. 10,000 years ago, we didn't eat lots of carbs or ingest loads of chemicals, we ate natural fruits, veggies, and meat. Most of us now don't have to worry about hunting or foraging, and now that the desperate struggle for survival is over for many of us, we have time to look inward and think about thoughts and emotions. I don't know about you guys, but any time I have time to look inward and deal with emotions, I go a little bit bananas. That's why we need an unnatural solution in many cases to help us cope with this incredibly unnatural world. It's not worth freaking out over; take a Xanax and chill :-).
The vast majority of the over-prescribed drugs have no medical efficacy. The only quality they have is that they are addictive. The drug companies see this as their business model, and so produce new addictive products. Their control of the government protects them from low cost competition (DEA) at a cost to the taxpayer of 100 billion dollars a year. The government forces users to obtain their drugs from pushers, who steer them toward the most addictive (profitable) drugs. So the drug companies use doctors as pushers. In Canada, doctors write huge numbers of prescriptions for drugs which the government pays for (especially Oxycontin), then sell them out the back door for cash.