Mass Psychosis in the US: How Big Pharma Hooked Americans on Drugs

[Donnachaidh]

https://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/07/16-1

Has America become a nation of psychotics? You would certainly think so, based on the explosion in the use of antipsychotic medications. In 2008, with over $14 billion in sales, antipsychotics became the single top-selling therapeutic class of prescription drugs in the United States, surpassing drugs used to treat high cholesterol and acid reflux.

Once upon a time, antipsychotics were reserved for a relatively small number of patients with hard-core psychiatric diagnoses - primarily schizophrenia and bipolar disorder - to treat such symptoms as delusions, hallucinations, or formal thought disorder. 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. 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.

It is anything but a coincidence that the explosion in antipsychotic use coincides with the pharmaceutical industry's development of a new class of medications known as "atypical antipsychotics." Beginning with Zyprexa, Risperdal, and Seroquel in the 1990s, followed by Abilify in the early 2000s, these drugs were touted as being more effective than older antipsychotics like Haldol and Thorazine. More importantly, they lacked the most noxious side effects of the older drugs - in particular, the tremors and other motor control problems.

The atypical anti-psychotics were the bright new stars in the pharmaceutical industry's roster of psychotropic drugs - costly, patented medications that made people feel and behave better without any shaking or drooling. Sales grew steadily, until by 2009 Seroquel and Abilify numbered fifth and sixth in annual drug sales, and prescriptions written for the top three atypical antipsychotics totaled more than 20 million. Suddenly, antipsychotics weren't just for psychotics any more.

More at the link --

[dionysus]

1. they've got us hooked on vaccines, too.

[Warpy]

12. Gee, only if we want to see our kids grow up

You do know that's what they're for, don't you?

Sheesh.

[dionysus]

15. you missed the fact i was using extreme

:sarcasm:

see posts 10&11
;)

[Warpy]

17. You hadn't posted 10 & 11 yet

and your sarcasm failed mightily.

Might I suggest you use the tag a bit earlier?

[dionysus]

19. i will next time. cheers!

:toast:

[blue neen]

2. "parasitic shrink industry"?

The author could have written an effective article about the misuse of anti-psychotics without demonizing ALL psychiatrists.

[Posteritatis]

14. But thought is hard, you see. (nt)

[DeSwiss]

3. They sicken us.....

...by adulterating and polluting our water and putting additives and crap in our food -- not to mention the genetic manipulation they do to it that they won't tell us about. And then they sell us "cures" in the form of pills, potions and procedures which often times makes us sicker than we were before we became conditioned and controlled by their system of "health care."

And the circle is complete.


- As WOPR concluded sometime ago, the only winning move is not to play.....



K&R

[CoffeeCat]

7. I've concluded, that all I can do is try to stay healthy...

I am exercising and eating right--and reading a great deal about what to eat
and what not to eat. There are so many pitfalls. Nothing with HFCS, no
partially hydrogenated fats, no processed foods, no dairy with growth hormones
and antibiotics, no beef with antibiotics and hormones, etc. Then you have to
watch out for the lethal effects of teflon pans, plastics in the microwave,
plastic water bottles, etc.

It never ends!

I'm trying to do all of the right things, but you can never keep up with the
poison that we're subjected to.

I just read that sweating is really good for you--because you sweat out many
toxins. Ok, I'll jog when it's 90 degrees out!

I also know how odd it is NOT to be on something from the big Pharma candy store.
The other day, when I went to the doctor, and I told her that I am not on any
medication (she asked), she looked at my like I was crazy and said, "Wow, I rarely
hear that answer these days!"

Godspeed to all of us.

[DeSwiss]

9. Exactly. I'm doing the same. :-D - n/t

[dionysus]

11. yeah but there's things like blood pressure pills that help millions of americans.

[HappyMe]

13. Yup. If it wasn't for them, cancer would have done me in. nt

[Desertrose]

4. we need to wake up ...quick!!

How many millennia have human beings lived, loved and grown old with out the help of big pharma????

[loyalsister]

6. I wouldn't

n\t

[tblue37]

18. Actually, the growing old part didn't last as long as it does now,

because life expectancy was a lot shorter.

[indurancevile]

21. Actually, it was generally shorter only for the lower classes, except for certain

epidemic-type infectious diseases.

Take a look, for example, at the founding fathers. You'll find most of them lived to fairly ripe old ages. There were 55 delegates to the 1787 convention:

For their era, the 1787 delegates (like the 1776 signers) were average in terms of life spans.<9> Their average age at death was about 67. The first to die was Houston in 1788; the last was Madison in 1836.

Secretary Charles Thomson lived to the age of 94. Johnson died at 92. John Adams lived to the age of 90. A few—Franklin, Jefferson, Madison, Williamson, and Wythe—lived into their eighties. Either 15 or 16 (depending on Fitzsimons's exact age) died in their seventies, 20 or 21 in their sixties, eight in their fifties, and five only in their forties.

Three (Alexander Hamilton, Richard Dobbs Spaight and Button Gwinnett) were killed in duels.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Founding_Fathers_of_the_United_States#Longevity_and_family_life

76% died in their 60s or older.

That's about the same as the ratio in my family today.

The fact is, if people get enough to eat, enough variety, practice basic sanitation & avoid war & plagues (which historically are associated with war), most that make it out of childhood will live the biblical "threescore & 10," on average.

[loyalsister]

5. Pharma is no friend of mine

But, there is a lot of info missing. For one thing, there is no mention of dose adjustment. I have Epilepsy and a number of the drugs I have and do take have been used for other purposes. Psychiatric and nerve related disorders in particular. Lyrica and Neurontin for example. But, I took much larger doses than other people. The fact that a drug was initially created for a specific use does not necessarily negate the legitimacy of other uses at varying doses.
Mental illness has long been under diagnosed.
Also, I know people who have Schizophrenia and other mental illnesses who would not be living outside of mental institutions if not for those newer drugs. Many people have a much better quality of life with less severe or fewer side effects. As a matter of fact, I am in a similar situation. Only the most extreme doses of several drugs have helped at all.
So, there are some important benefits to the availability of these drugs.
At the same time, I don't deny that Americans are over medicated to some extent. I think that it should be against the law to run pharmaceutical ads on TV especially when they end with "ask your doctor about ..... it may be able to help." or offering free samples.

[dionysus]

10. a friend of mine was prescribed something after he had seizures... i looked it up and it was also

used the treat schizophrenia.

this almost reminds me of anti vaccination stuff.

[hfojvt]

8. man, that is a depressing thought

quick, where is my prozac?

[dionysus]

16. *boom tiss* he's here all week folks, don't forget to try the veal...

[Odin2005]

20. This is fearmongering garbage.

[Union Scribe]

22. L. Ron in the heezie!

Stupid shrinks trying to drug us so we won't know the truth about thetans.

[Posteritatis]

23. Hee. (nt)

[provis99]

24. judging by the average voter, America needs anti-psychotic drugs.

[LetTimmySmoke]

25. Zyprexa? Risperdal? Seroquel? I prefer old-fashioned drugs.