The bravery and dogged persistence of one woman, Rosie Tilli, was in the background to the last RxISK post – Could Journalists be Doctors in Disguise. Her story featured the same day in Antidepressants can Cause Chemical Castration, an article by Maryanne Demasi, a rather exceptional journalist.
Lest anyone think there is a cosy club here, Maryanne and I fell out over a decade ago about the best way to cover issues like this. The media are wed to the Rotten Apple approach for which an individual story and a Named person are key.
An Individual Story and Named Person are also key to medical practice – much more so than randomized controlled trials or any other approach to evidence. Individual cases are logically prior to anything else and even though the story may not look a good one to be the Foundation of a Building, and the builders may be inclined to reject it, there are precedents going back two thousand years for saying that it can turn out to be the Cornerstone.
Good doctoring starts with story-building. Good investigative journalism also starts with a story but also needs to diagnose the system – the structural problems in the building. The Rotten Barrel. Just telling Rotten Apple stories risks making things worse by giving people the impression this problem is now solved and everything is back hunky-dory again
Both journalists and doctors need to work on why we have been so slow to get to grips with certain stories. Why in this case both doctors and journalists are increasingly likely to view the stories of people who have been harmed by drugs and vaccines as misinformation and groups of ordinary folk (patients) attempting to get to the bottom of what happened them as prone to conspiracy theories.
One part of the answer is that some of the legacy media, the New York Times and Guardian, the BBC, the New England Journal of Medicine and the BMJ, who were once on the side of ordinary folk, have now been seduced over to the side of the authorities. Seduced by authorities who claim to have the interests of ordinary folk at heart and claim what is often fraudulent evidence trumps the evidence of our own eyes.
This ain’t easy for journalists or doctors. Well-paying jobs are likely to dry up. The comfort in doing a job you love is likely to vanish. The two professions have a lot at stake and a lot in common.
This post is down to the bravery and dogged persistence of one woman, Katinka Newman, and several families including Ian and Tania Morgan, along with the Daily Mail, who in contrast to other legacy media have, in recent years, been doing rather well with health stories involving medicines.
Katinka is the woman in the Journalists and Doctors post who has been working on an article for over a month. She gets a key point into the public domain – this is laid out in When Will Medical Insurers Stop Killing people and Psychiatrists Suicide Note. The point is that doctors and medical insurers and the advice of insurers to doctors to never speak up and say it looks like the drug caused this problem – in this case a death by suicide – is at the heart of the problem.
While only touched upon here, it is to Katinka’s credit, and the Daily Mail’s, that this point is there and may now be something coroners, medical insurers, royal colleges and regulators will find difficult to avoid.
Katinka’s Article
KATINKA BLACKFORD NEWMAN FOR THE DAILY MAIL
All grief can cause complex feelings — but losing someone to suicide comes with a particular sense of agonising regret, powerlessness and unanswered questions.
The knowledge that a prescription drug might be the cause can only exacerbate that pain, particularly if the prescribed drugs in question are antidepressants — pills that are supposed to prevent people from feeling suicidal.
Tania and Ian Morgan, from Swansea, lost their 25-year-old son, Sam, when he killed himself in January 2020. They believe his death was caused by an adverse reaction to an antidepressant.
‘Sam had everything going for him,’ says Tania, 57, a head teacher. ‘He had a steady girlfriend of six years, no financial worries and a group of fantastic friends. He was a junior trader for a financial company and had a great future ahead of him.’
Sam had been taking the antidepressant citalopram for seven days prior to his death. Citalopram is a type of antidepressant known as a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI), which is thought to work by increasing serotonin levels in the brain.
Tania and Sam
While antidepressants can be life-changing for many, there is evidence that they can raise the risk of suicide, with experts arguing they can even make people who aren’t depressed feel suicidal.
A significant piece of research published in April, in the journal Ethical Human Psychology and Psychiatry, raises doubts as to the efficacy of antidepressants, as well as adding to concerns that these pills may increase suicide.
The study looked at nearly 8,000 reports from coroners’ inquests in England and Wales between 2003 and 2020 where antidepressants were mentioned and found that around half of the deaths were definitively ruled to be suicides.
The study author, John Read, a professor of clinical psychology at the University of East London, concluded: ‘We do not know in how many cases the problems for which the drugs were prescribed contributed to the deaths. Nor can we tell in how many of the 7,829 cases that antidepressants contributed to the deaths.
‘We can say, however, that antidepressants failed to lift the depression sufficiently to prevent these deaths.’
The study was based on research by a grieving father, trying to come to terms with losing his ‘happy-go-lucky son’, who killed himself after taking the antidepressant drug citalopram.
The father, Brian, who wishes to give only his first name, was convinced his 30-year-old son’s death in 2009 was caused by an adverse reaction to the drug.
‘He had everything going for him and wasn’t depressed,’ he told Good Health. ‘He loved life. He was just a bit stressed at work and couldn’t sleep.’
After his son’s death, Brian began studying newspaper reports of inquests in England and Wales where antidepressants were mentioned and posted them on his website AntiDepAware. His findings were then analysed by Professor Read, who concluded in his report that the figures were likely to be the tip of the iceberg, as many suicides and inquests are not reported in the media.
One in six people in England (8.32 million) took antidepressants in 2021/22, a 5 per cent increase from a year earlier, according to NHS data.
Not all will be taking them for depression, as antidepressants can be prescribed for many other conditions including eating disorders, mild anxiety and pain relief.
Since 2004, all antidepressants have carried warnings on the information leaflet in the packet, explaining that if you have suicidal thoughts these may increase when you first start taking the medication because they take a few weeks to work. Some experts believe the wording is inadequate and misleading. David Healy, a former professor of psychiatry at the University of Wales College of Medicine, has worked as a consultant to pharmaceutical companies who make antidepressants.
He has been writing to regulators and coroners in the UK for 24 years about the need for clearer warnings. ‘As far back as the 1990s, it was well known among the drug companies from the clinical trials that antidepressants can directly cause even healthy people to commit suicide after they’ve been on the drug for a few days,’ he told Good Health.
He describes how these drugs can cause intense agitation and emotional turmoil in some — ‘yet calm others down’.
‘This is because our serotonin systems differ,’ Professor Healy says. He is routinely contacted by grieving families of people who have taken their lives and who believe that depression medication was a possible cause.
Tania and Ian Morgan found Professor Healy through an internet search as they struggled to make sense of their son’s death. Sam had not been depressed when he visited his doctor in January 2020.
‘Over Christmas, he had a persistent cough and had been unable to revise for his financial advising exams so he went to see his GP to get a sick note for the examination board,’ says Tania. ‘He also mentioned that he was feeling nervous about his exams.’
Sam asked the doctor if he could have some citalopram.
‘He knew about it because a friend had taken it and said it helped with her anxiety,’ says Tania. ‘Yes, Sam was nervous about his exam but that was just normal levels of stress.’
In a consultation that lasted ten minutes, Sam’s GP prescribed him a 14-day course of 10mg of citalopram, the lowest dose.
After Sam’s death the doctor told the Morgans that he didn’t want to give Sam the tablets because he didn’t feel he needed them but Sam persuaded him.
The GP also gave Sam the standard advice — that the tablets might make him feel worse before he feels better. Sam lived at home and his parents noticed a difference after he had taken just one dose.
‘There was an instant change in his mental state,’ says Ian.
This is what convinces the Morgans, like other bereaved families, that it was the drug, not their loved one’s mental state, that made them suicidal.
‘He just seemed apathetic and as if he’d given up on life,’ says Ian. ‘He said he felt sick and was unable to sleep. There was a greyness about him and his eyes were just dead.
‘Overnight, he had gone from being chatty and cheerful to being morose and like a zombie.’
Seven days after Sam had visited his GP, Ian saw his son for the last time.
‘It was in the morning and I was getting ready for work,’ says Ian, 58, a retail sales consultant.
‘I passed Sam’s bedroom and he said he felt sick and hadn’t slept so was going to take the day off. I asked if he wanted to put the heating on and he said yes.’
Tania came home later that day to find her son dead, a scene that will forever haunt her.
‘It was total shock and disbelief. I can’t begin to describe it. I felt totally numb,’ she says. ‘Sam was the last person in the world to kill himself.
‘Firstly, we wondered if there was something going on in his life that we didn’t know about, such as financial problems or a gambling addiction — but there was nothing. The only thing that had changed recently in Sam’s life was that he had started taking antidepressants.’
Their suspicions were confirmed when they contacted Professor Healy and showed him Sam’s medical records.
‘There was no reasonable explanation for why this young man ended up dead a week after beginning on this drug other than the drug had caused the problem,’ says Professor Healy.
The Morgans want to prevent other lives being lost.
They were frustrated that at the inquest the coroner ruled a narrative verdict (which records the factual circumstances of a death only, without attributing a cause), saying that ‘the effect of this medication [citalopram] on Sam is unknown’ and were disappointed that the GP’s legal team dismissed the link between the drug and Sam’s death.
However, Professor Healy believes that doctors are reluctant to speak out about the potential harms of medication because they are advised by medical insurers that it may put them at risk of litigation. This makes it hard to bring about change. ‘If doctors admit that the drug caused the problem, then the MHRA [Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency] have to sit up and take notice and do something to warn the public by requiring drug companies to make their warnings clearer,’ says Professor Healy.
The Morgans agree that current warnings in the patient information leaflet, which are written by drug companies and approved by MHRA, are both misleading and not prominent enough.
‘Buried in 3,000 words about citalopram there is a warning in the small print that if you already have thoughts of killing yourself then these may become worse,’ says Ian. ‘If Sam had known that the drugs were actually making him feel suicidal, he would probably not have continued taking them and he would still be here now.’
Professor Healy adds: ‘The wording needs to explicitly say that these drugs can directly cause suicide even in healthy volunteers taking them. If you feel strange or agitated, stop taking them. There will always be another antidepressant from a different class that will suit you better.’
This wording should also be somewhere obvious, he suggests.
Separately, Professor Healy thinks that telling patients that the drugs can take weeks to work could be costing lives — for while your illness might take time to respond, patients should be warned explicitly that they should not feel worse in the interim.
‘An adverse reaction to antidepressants can happen within hours,’ says Professor Healy. ‘People describe an agitation that they compare with being on the 55th floor of a building with flames surrounding them and it’s more comfortable to jump off than endure the agony. This uncontrollable urge to kill yourself is quite unlike depression.’
Professor Healy saw this at first hand when he ran a trial of the antidepressant sertraline in North Wales back in 1999.
None of the 20 volunteers had any mental illness — but after just a few days two of them, women in their early 30s, became suicidal. One was a doctor, the other was an administrator.
Professor Healy has agreed to share extracts from their diaries, kept as part of the trial, with Good Health.
One wrote after four days: ‘I know with absolute clarity and certainty that I had to go through the door out to the road and wait for a car. It had to be very final. A car or a train but a car was the overwhelming image. Yes, it would be violent but that was vital and necessary.’
Another volunteer wrote after ten days: ‘I must admit I have nightmares, the same one [on] two consecutive nights where I’m hanging myself . . . in our bedroom.’
Doctors read the diaries daily and both volunteers had to be taken off the trial for their own safety. Neither had ever felt suicidal before taking the drug and haven’t since. The power of antidepressants to cause people who aren’t depressed to want to harm themselves is something I have experienced personally.
In 2012 I was struggling with insomnia while going through a divorce and visited my doctor for sleeping pills. Instead, he prescribed the antidepressant escitalopram, which triggered a four-day delirium during which I hallucinated about how to end my life.
Admitted to a private hospital, I returned to normality after a few days once the drug wore off. Yet the doctors insisted I’d had psychotic depression, and gave me more antidepressants and also antipsychotics, triggering another adverse reaction and a year-long, drug-induced illness.
One symptom of drug-induced suicidality is an agonising condition, akathisia, a movement disorder where you cannot keep still and are seized with an inexplicable acute anxiety: I suffered from this on and off for a year.
Looking back, it was a miracle I didn’t end my life. I completely recovered within three weeks of finally being taken off all six drugs I had been prescribed. That was ten years ago; I have been medication-free and have not had mental health problems since.
My terrifying ordeal with antidepressants led me to write a book — The Pill That Steals Lives — and set up a website, Antidepressantrisks.org. As a result, I’m contacted by many others with similar experiences.
One of these was 31-year-old Tara Baker, a catering assistant from Pembrokeshire, who considers she is lucky to have survived her experience with antidepressants.
Like many, she was struggling with the effects of Covid on her mental health when she went to her GP in March 2021.
‘I just felt anxious about not being able to go out and the fact that my little boy was coming up to nearly two and I felt he’d missed out on so much,’ she says.
‘It was financial stress as well, as my husband had been made redundant. I wouldn’t say I was depressed. I was just mildly anxious and I couldn’t sleep properly.’
Tara asked her GP for an antidepressant: ‘A few of my friends were on them and I thought it would be a quick fix.
‘The nurse practitioner gave me a prescription for sertraline [a type of SSRI] after just a five-minute phone consultation.
Within an hour of taking the first tablet, Tara had an extreme reaction: ‘I felt really shaky, was having cold sweats and my pupils were huge.
‘I had these random intrusive thoughts about killing myself. It was as if a video was playing in my head. I went for a walk to calm myself down but then I just pictured myself jumping into the water.’
Tara continued to take the pills because she, too, had been told that she might feel worse before she felt better.
Her condition deteriorated and after three days of not sleeping or eating she contacted her GP who prescribed a tranquilliser, diazepam, and advised she keep taking the antidepressants.
After a week, Tara, who had never felt suicidal before, tried to end her life. She says: ‘My brain just wouldn’t stop. I just felt this unbearable agony and I wanted it to go away.
‘I know it sounds insane but I was convinced I was sacrificing myself to save my family so God would understand. I felt really out of it, as if I had no emotions.’
Fortunately, Tara’s husband came home in time and called an ambulance.
The crisis team at her local hospital recognised that she had an adverse reaction to the sertraline and told her to stop taking the tablets immediately.
Tara was so frightened that she asked to be sectioned but the doctors wouldn’t do this. She asked the crisis team to drive her to another hospital where she admitted herself.
‘I slept for 16 hours and when I woke up everything was OK — but I was still shell-shocked,’ she says. ‘I told one of the nurses that the antidepressants had caused this and she said it couldn’t be possible because sertraline takes three weeks to have any effect.
‘It took me a few weeks to feel completely normal but I think that was partly because of the trauma.’
It has been two years since Tara’s ordeal and she thinks she had a lucky escape.
‘I’ve still got a bit of anxiety about certain things, but I deal with it by distracting myself until it passes and by keeping myself busy.’
A spokesperson for the MHRA told Good Health: ‘Patient safety is our top priority. ‘We have kept the safety of SSRIs under constant review ever since they were first licensed. The available data continue to show that the benefits of SSRIs in treating depression and other psychiatric illnesses outweigh the potential risks for most people.
‘Following concerns raised by patients and families about the effectiveness of product information warnings, we have established a new independent expert group to advise the Government’s statutory advisory committee, the Commission on Human Medicines. This will consider whether changes are needed to the current risk minimisation materials for SSRIs, including the patient information leaflets.’
The spokesperson added: ‘Patients who have concerns should talk to their doctor and should not stop taking their antidepressant medication without their doctor’s advice.’
Notes
There are a few points to note here. The British Drugs Regulator, MHRA, like FDA in the US and EMA in Europe is a bureaucracy. No one should expect a bureaucrat or bureaucracy to ever be able to work out whether a drug is causing an adverse effect or not. They have no training in doing this.
No-one, not even God, can work out cause and effect in these cases without consulting the records or interviewing the family of someone like Sam. The MHRA have not contacted Ian or Tania.
We all, including doctors and journalists, want a God or Father figure, to keep us safe. This is a well recognized defense mechanism called Delegated Narcissism. We need to get over it. It leads us to confuse bureaucrats for Daddy – or for the kind of Leader we need.
Leadership can come from three places – one of which is professionals, which doctors once were. In following Guidelines and Drug Labels, doctors have becoming bureaucrats.
Dr Adams, Sam’s doctor, is a key person in this case. His view is important but he was advised by his insurer not to talk to me or offer a view at the inquest and he followed advice. He could still lead, if he chose.
Continuing to act on advice like this is going to put doctors out of business. Who needs them? They cost more than nurses who can dish out these ultra harmless drugs just as easily and less expensively.
Leadership can also come from politicians. This is supposed to be their role – but on matters like this, as Eluned Morgan’s department (the Welsh Mental Health Minister) has shown again and again they defer to MHRA – see Morgan v Morgan. It might need someone like Eluned to lose a child to one of these drugs to mobilize her into action – into doing her job.
Leadership in these areas has been left to people like Katinka, Ian and Tania, Rosie in Maryanne’s article, Yoko and Vincent, along with Dan, mentioned in the Royal College Suicide post.
Hospital Pass – Recipe for Disaster
The failure of MHRA, Eluned Morgan and others to lead becomes starkly clear in the last sentence of Katinka’s article, which offers advice from MHRA:
Patients who have concerns should talk to their doctor and should not stop taking their antidepressant medication without their doctor’s advice.
This is what in Rugby circles is called a Hospital Pass. If you don’t see why, you don’t understand what is going on. This is buck passing. Doctors who should do more to keep themselves informed, and should have more backbone, are being sent patients in drug-induced distress, like Rosie.
If you follow MHRA’s advice, you risk being good and properly fucked. The dose of your medicine may be doubled. Other drugs may be thrown in the mix or like Rosie you may be detained in hospital – by a bunch of what can only called crazy doctors.
We don’t even know whether it more likely than not you will come to grief at the hands of your doctor.
In the current situation, no-one should be giving and no one should be given advice like this. What should they given?
That’s the problem that doctors and regulators and pharma and insurers have helped create. The others won’t go out of business if this problem isn’t solved but doctors possibly will or perhaps that should be should.
annie says
Most of us who comment on DH blogs and RxISK, have had some sort of ‘a close shave’, a ‘brush with death’ from SSRIs, or other drugs, primarily caused by the ‘Cloth-Eared Brigade’.
For Katinka, to write two extraordinarily brilliant articles as featured in the Daily Mail, and then to add insult to injury, the MHRA, to write such impoverished and churlish responses is such an insult to the bravery of those speaking out. The Doctors aren’t speaking out.
We have heard of two recent deaths of children, Dexter and Romain to add to the numbers.
Just numbers, from people like Louis Appleby, who I always wonder how he keeps his job…
louis appleby
@ProfLAppleby
·
Jun 12
This is wrong & should be deleted @BPSOfficial .
You should quote figures by date of death, not date of registration, as inquests were disrupted by Covid.
Teenage suicide rates by date of death for most recent yrs:
2017 – 3.3
2018 – 3.1
2019 – 2.8
2020 – 2.9
2021 – 2.6
https://twitter.com/BPSOfficial/status/1668220396099739649…
This Tweet was deleted by the Tweet author. Learn more
If the tragic loss of life isn’t bad enough, the injustice of it all puts the harmed and bereaved in a place where they have to endure the life-changing ‘power-imbalance’.
From the MHRA down to the Doctors, there is the unedifying loss of our ‘power-base’. You can feel deprived of feelings of equality with your fellow-man, put on the left-foot for the remainder of your days.
This can include family, friends, colleagues.
To some, it’s all a big joke…
The promotion of a hashtag by RCPsych
https://holeousia.com/2023/06/13/the-promotion-of-a-hashtag-by-rcpsych/
Dan Johnson
@DanJohnsonAB
Could Doctors be Journalists in Disguise | RxISK
Money has invaded your health care. Die and shut up.
https://rxisk.org/could-doctors-be-journalists-in-disguise/
5:14 AM · Jun 14, 2023
Dan Johnson
@DanJohnsonAB
·
1h
Or vice versa.
– by a bunch of what can only called crazy doctors.
There is no ‘rumour-mongering’ going on here…
tim says
Thank you. Absolutely brilliant report on the dangers, and risks of akathisia, disinhibition and emotional blunting induced by SSRIs/SNRIs/ADs (and other prescription medications).
The unforgivable denial and rejection of antidepressant Adverse Drug Reactions (ADRs) has persisted for decades. This denial not only fails to prevent drug induced violence against self and/or others but leaves investigation of acts of violence devoid of critical information in an unsuccessful search for ‘The Motive’.
The apparently omitted critical question is: “What prescription medication had been introduced, reduced, increased in dosage or “enhanced” prior to an act of self harm, suicide, violence or homicide”?
Whilst terrorism may be the first consideration in mass homicide, surely ADRs MUST ALWAYS be considered?
So many individual precious lives and livelihoods destroyed or terminated. Families devastated and overwhelmed by the unrelenting sorrow caused by avoidable ADR induced tragedy.
We all write here in the hope of preventing such lifelong grief and bereavement for others.
This wonderfully written post keeps our hopes alive.
susanne says
Unfortunately there is only one reference in the news about suicide The rest is the usual sensationalist headlines But it could provide a way forward if doctors are obliged to tell the whole truth under cross examination ?
Inquests may curb more mental health killings
7 days ago
Amanda, who was stabbed by her son, says she was “appalled” at the time it had taken for the case to be reviewed
By Will Fyfe
BBC Wales Live
Inquests held by coroners would make the biggest difference in preventing future killings involving mental health patients, according to a senior barrister.
There have been seven Welsh homicides carried out by acutely unwell mental health patients since 2016.
However none of these have received a full coroner’s inquest.
The Ministry of Justice said it could not comment on decisions by individual coroners.
A senior barrister said the Welsh government’s new system to review such cases was unlikely to be enough.
‘I still speak to my brother who killed our dad’
Mum demands apology for killer son and his victim
Bereaved mum says hospital failed her daughter
Lord Alex Carlile said it would take more to hold services to account and teach the necessary lessons.
The Welsh government said its new reviews would see learning from mental health killings “adopted throughout Wales”.
BBC Wales Investigates found one patient in Borth, Ceredigion, stabbed a stranger 10 days after being released from a psychiatric unit.
He was discharged despite doctors highlighting his “worsening mental state” and the risk he “posed with knives”.
David Fleet, who was 20 at the time, attacked Lewis Stone, 71, while he was walking his dog because of “the voices in his head”.
David Fleet stabbed a man to death 10 days after leaving a psychiatric unit
An internal review by Hywel Dda University Health Board into David Fleet’s care found “missed opportunities,” but lessons from the case were not shared directly with other health boards or made public.
The killing in 2019 received no coroner’s inquest hearing or independent review.
“In Wales, in my view, the biggest single difference [to preventing mental health homicides] would be to mandate that there should be a proper inquest in each case of this type,” said Lord Carlile, a previous chairman of parliamentary committees on mental health legislation.
What are coroner’s inquests?
A coroner’s inquest is a type of investigation into any death which appears to have unknown, violent or unnatural causes
Coroners are a type of specialist judge, most are lawyers themselves and answer only to the High Court
Their inquests are heard in public – and can involve witnesses and evidence
Normally they answer four questions: Who has died, how did it happen, where and when? However, some special forms of inquest can also look at whether any organisations may have been at fault in the build-up to the death
Coroners don’t have the power to blame individuals – but can reach a “narrative” conclusion where they describe the circumstances surrounding the death – and write reports suggesting action to help prevent similar deaths
Lord Carlile
Lord Carlile said it was vital to look “at the lessons from past cases”
“It’s public, so it is accountable, and the evidence is tested forensically, by which I mean the barristers or solicitors can cross-examine witnesses, including expert witnesses, to ascertain that everything is revealed,” said Lord Carlile.
He said it was vital to look “at the lessons from past cases”.
Several coroners’ offices told BBC Wales Live that mental health homicides which all go through the crown court were unlikely to get inquest hearings too as it risked duplicating already heard material.
However, some of the families involved are concerned.
They believe more should be done to hear about potential failings and missed opportunities in the build-up to killings.
Four months after he was discharged from a psychiatric unit, Garvey Gayle stabbed his mum Amanda multiple times and killed his father in 2020.
Amanda said the attack could have been prevented if her son had been given more support.
More than two-and-a-half years later, she is still waiting to find out if there will be a coroner’s inquest into Michael’s death.
She is worried lessons, which could help prevent similar incidents, are taking too long.
Garvey Gayle was discharged from a psychiatric unit months before he attacked his parents
“I just want some answers about how, maybe, this could have been prevented if we’d had more help,” she said.
“There are a lot of unanswered questions at the moment we’re still waiting on.”
Amanda is now pushing for a special type of inquest, called an Article 2 inquest.
This would look at Michael’s death and whether any organisations involved in her son’s care need to make changes.
She said it was vital for her family that they learned whether anything could have been done to prevent the attack.
The Welsh government’s new process for independent reviews into these cases is supposed to take less than a year from the time they are commissioned.
Garvey Gayle’s case will be one of the first to be looked at under the new system.
Amanda said she had been told not to expect the results until after the third anniversary of Michael’s death.
Amanda says the waiting time is not fair on the families
She said she was “appalled” at the time it had taken.
“I don’t think it’s fair on the family at all,” Amanda added. “I don’t understand why these things have taken so long. I just hope another family doesn’t have to experience what we’re going through.”
South Wales Police, Cardiff and Vale University Health Board and the Welsh government said they could not comment on the case because of the review.
The Welsh government said its new review system would recognise the need for “greater co-ordination and communication” between organisations when investigating mental health homicides.”
A spokesperson said the new system “eliminates” the need of multiple “onerous and traumatising reviews”.
They added it will “build a greater understanding of what happened during an incident and why, and provide a clear action plan to improve services.
“Importantly, it will ensure learning is adopted throughout Wales,” they added.
Wales Live is on BBC One Wales at 22:40 BST on Wednesday and on BBC iPlayer
Student told uni he was suicidal before death
1 May
Charlie McLeod and his mum Emma Laney
Mum demands apology for killer son and his victim
Published
5 June
mary H says
It is my belief that a person declaring that they are having suicidal thoughts is often dismissed by the mental health services and hospital Units as either ‘a cry for help’ or ‘ attention seeking’. Unless we can get the staff to accept that the very “medications” that these patients are on can, of themselves, create these feelings – and worse, in many cases,- I fear that the numbers of cases will continue, at least at their present level. It’s time to look beyond the patient and study their prescriptions. If we, as families along with some professionals, can see the pattern created by these prescribed drugs, why can’t mental health staff also accept it?
chris says
Yes indeed. But the vehemence against this in psych hospitals is horrific. They know very well it’s the ‘medications’ and then they threaten you with them when you try to speak out. It’s criminal and why the Essex Inquiry will not be converted to a statutory inquiry – what it will uncover must not be allowed to get out.
annie says
Scotland’s transport minister has resigned from the Scottish government due to poor mental health.
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/health/other/scotlands-transport-minister-quits-due-to-poor-mental-health/ar-AA1ccf1o
He then became the minister for mental wellbeing and social care in 2021 before being handed the transport brief back in March when Mr Yousaf took the reins.
“I do hope that you understand.”
SNP ‘mental wellbeing’ minister Kevin Stewart in foul-mouthed 1am bust-up with fellow party member at boozy ‘drag bingo’ club event hours before Nicola Sturgeon’s conference speech
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11306291/SNP-mental-wellbeing-minister-foul-mouthed-1am-bust-drag-bingo-nightclub-event.html
Stewart: MSPs must do everything they can to reduce suicide in Scotland
Mental wellbeing minister Kevin Stewart delivered a statement to Holyrood on Wednesday after the launch of a new strategy.
https://news.stv.tv/politics/kevin-stewart-msps-must-do-everything-they-can-to-reduce-suicide-in-scotland
Mental wellbeing minister Kevin Stewart delivered a statement to Holyrood on Wednesday after the launch of a strategy aimed at tackling factors and inequalities that can lead to suicide.
Creating Hope Together: Scotland’s Suicide Prevention Strategy is a 10-year plan from Cosla and the Scottish Government to address the underlying social issues that can cause people to feel suicidal, while providing support to those affected by suicide, such as families, friends and carers.
The Treatment was Great, The Patient Died
Dear Mr. Stewart,
https://rxisk.org/the-treatment-was-great-the-patient-died/
Mr Stewart’s office responded on November 15. Stewart Response.
Dear Professor Healy,
Thank you for your letter dated 31st October 2022, regarding Mr Hughes and your wider comments on mental health practices and medication.
https://rxisk.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/Response-202200328217.pdf
Well, that went well, for Scotland and Suicide Prevention…
susanne says
‘Shocking’ lack of evidence on antidepressants for chronic pain
Published
10 May
By Michelle Roberts
Digital health editor
People with chronic pain are being given antidepressants with very little scientific proof the medication helps, a major review has found.
In studies, with nearly 30,000 patients, there was “moderate” evidence for only one drug, duloxetine, and just for short-term pain relief.
And there was a “shocking” lack of long-term data, even though the pills are usually prescribed for many months.
But patients are advised to stay on medication if it works for them.
2 of 5
‘The Antidepressant Story’ airs tonight in the UK on BBC1 as part of investigative documentary series Panorama
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‘The Antidepressant Story’ airs tonight on BBC1 as part of the UK’s investigative documentary series Panorama
The episode will be aired on BBC1 at 8pm in England and Northern Ireland, 10.40pm in Scotland and 11.10pm in Wales, and available afterwards on BBC iPlayer to those in the UK. You can read more about it on the programme website here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001n39z
In response to the Panorama episode, a brief anonymous survey has been set up for those over 16 in the UK to capture experiences of stopping or trying to stop antidepressants. This survey has been created by the UK’s Lived Experience Advisory Panel for Prescribed Drug Dependence who will use the information to better understand what kind of services people might need in order to safely stop their medication. The data may also be shared with NHS organisations to let them know the level of demand in their area.
Take the Survey
susanne says
The MHRA is considering …..
21 June 2023
The MHRA will consider whether further action is needed after a coroner warned doctors were unaware of a rare risk of suicide linked to the commonly used antibiotic ciprofloxacin.
A prevention of future deaths report said that a respected and experienced consultant cardiologist, who had recently retired, died by suicide 11 days after being prescribed a course of ciprofloxacin to relieve his symptoms of prostatitis ahead of investigations for prostate cancer.
The inquest into his death heard that Dr Robert Stevenson, who had worked at Huddersfield Royal Infirmary, had no previous history of depression or mental health problems.
On the day he died, he had left the house for his usual walk and his family had no indications that suggested they should be concerned, coroner Martin Fleming said. The 63-year-old messaged his wife to say that he had left a note under his pillow and was later found dead in a nearby wood.
In a report sent to medicines regulators, Mr Fleming said the urologist who had prescribed the antibiotic had referred him to published literature linking ciprofloxacin and quinoline antibiotics with a potential rare link to suicidal behaviour.
While it was unclear if he was suffering from this side effect, it remained possible, he said.
‘I heard evidence to suggest that the prescribing doctor did not reference this side effect at the time of issuing the prescription to Mr Stevenson, since it was not in accord with current advice,’ Mr Fleming wrote.
‘I also heard evidence to suggest that prescribing doctors may not be fully aware of this rare side effect, and that patient’s suffering from depression may be more vulnerable to it.’
In the report sent to the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) he continued: ‘I am therefore concerned that this potential risk has not been given sufficient emphasis and I would ask you to consider the appropriateness of reviewing the current guidelines as to the dispensation of the drug to patients by clinicians and increasing the awareness of the side effect in order to monitor and mitigate the risks.’
Psychiatric side effects, including suicidal behaviours, have been reported following ciprofloxacin and the patient information leaflet warns of these risks, the MHRA said.
In response to the coroner’s report, Dr Janine Jolly, MHRA deputy director of benefit/risk Evaluation, said: ‘We are very sorry to hear of Dr Stevenson’s death and would like to express our sympathies to his family.
‘As with any serious suspected side effects, reports of fatalities are evaluated by us including an assessment of post-mortem details if available. We will be reviewing the coroner’s verdict.
‘We will carefully consider the points raised by the coroner in the Regulation 28 Report to consider whether further regulatory action is required to minimise risks to patients and will provide a response upon completion of our investigation.’
Doctors who experience mental health concerns can reach out for support from Doctors in Distress and NHS P
susanne says
Jaqui Wise writes the laziest pieces of ‘journalism in thebmj – heres the latest – which does though highlight that for the majority it will be business as usual for the way they are prescribed potentially harmful and lethal drugs
BMJ 2023; 381 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.p1419 (Published 20 June 2023)
Cite this as: BMJ 2023;381:p1419
Jacqui Wise
Author affiliations
A group of scientists have said a review which concluded there was no consistent evidence of a relationship between serotonin and depression was biased and seriously flawed.1
Last July a systematic umbrella review, published in Molecular Psychiatry, concluded “there is no convincing evidence that depression is associated with or caused by lower serotonin concentrations or activity” and questioned the reasons behind high prescribing rates of antidepressants.23
Writing in the same journal, 36 researchers have criticised the paper saying there were methodological weaknesses in the review process, selective reporting of data, oversimplification, and errors in the interpretation of neuropsychopharmacological findings.
Lead author of the comment piece, Sameer Jauhar, senior clinical lecturer in affective disorders and psychosis at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology, …
susanne says
This is the article which has begun a thread but only 3 responses so far (I disagree that clinics will be the answer – are drug co’s likely to fund them? -(one suggestion) – very few would be referred to them – it would be an admittance of the harms they cause . Can’t think of another drug harm funded that way They will wait and pay damages as with opiods while prescribing carries on as usual aided by the usual culprits. Tapering has been carried out fofr decades on a self help basis alone or in like minded groups yet medics still aren’t trained up to use them.
None of the defenders have raised the issue of the secrecy, corruption and lack of informed consent. It seems to be hidden under the disengenuous use of so called ‘shared decision making’.
Opinion
Open letter
The government has a moral duty to help those harmed by prescribed dependence forming drugs
BMJ 2023; 381 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.p1417 (Published 20 June 2023)
Cite this as: BMJ 2023;381:p1417
Intended for healthcare professionals
Dear Editor,
I would like to add my support to the proposal put forward by Davies et al [1]. I also agree with Groot et al that it is vital that practical means are provided for patients to taper their medication gradually and hyperbolically [2].
As a retired NHS psychiatrist I was disappointed in the response made by the Royal College of Psychiatrists on an issue that is devastating lives. The College went no further than to say “Most people will be able to stop taking antidepressants without significant difficulty by reducing the dose (known as ‘tapering’) over a few weeks or months” [3]. The Royal College of Psychiatrists “the voice of psychiatry” does not hold back in celebrating its achievements, yet in the glossy, recently published Impact Report, there is no mention of this issue, let alone any efforts to address, what can be, protracted iatrogenic suffering [4]. Yet again, the College seems to be downplaying this issue. One can only speculate why.
British Psychiatry is heavily influenced by opinion leaders who are often paid by industry [5]. These opinion leaders are in positions where they can significantly influence prescribing of psychiatric drugs. Furthermore, this group determinedly shape and form the overall narrative arguing that they are free from “ideology”. Yet, the exact basis of their “joint working” is generally opaque [6].
As far as I am aware the Royal College of Psychiatrists has made no formal response to the Cumberlege Review [7]. If I am correct, this is concerning. Without addressing the recommendations of this review how can we, the public, be confident that another generation will not have their lives devastated by drugs taken as prescribed?
Competing interests: [1] My life has been devastated by prescribed dependence on an SSRI drug [2] In the past I raised a petition with the Scottish Parliament to introduce a Sunshine Act for Scotland
22 June 2023
Peter J. Gordon
Retired NHS doctor
Bridge of Allan
We endorse the proposal put forth by Davies et al. for the funding and implementation of withdrawal support services, inclusive of a national helpline. However, we would argue that it is equally, if not more, essential to provide practical means for patients to taper their medication gradually and hyperbolically. The necessity for withdrawal support services is contingent upon the extent of problems individuals encounter when discontinuing medications. When there are no problems, there is no need for these services.
Consider this in the context of sanitation. In regions where water resources, infrastructure, or sanitation systems are insufficient, diseases proliferate, causing people to become ill or die prematurely. Complex measures are necessary to keep the situation manageable. In modern society, the availability of sewers and clean, running water is the game-changer, not the provision of additional services or a national helpline.
The same logic applies to safely discontinuing medications. Enabling patients to taper hyperbolically and sufficiently gradually, which necessitates a personalized approach, will aid a significant number of patients to taper without major, or any, problems. This will significantly reduce the need for, and the costs associated with, the services Davies et al. rightly advocate for.
We maintain that it would be both wise and cost-effective to facilitate general practitioners and psychiatrists in prescribing longer and considerably more gradual tapering trajectories to their patients and to reimburse the necessary medication for this. As stated by Mark Horowitz in the BBC’s Panorama, pharmaceutical companies selling antidepressants are essentially selling cars without brakes. We concur with this assessment and contend that these companies have a moral obligation to provide the “brakes” that are now universally recognized as necessary. We consider it unjust that patients desiring to use these “brakes”, whether it be fluid medication or tapering strips [1], should bear the cost themselves, or that this should be a financial burden on the NHS.
Our latest observational study demonstrated that the use of tapering strips to gradually taper over extended periods helps to prevent withdrawal problem [2]. This study showed that longer tapers result in fewer withdrawal symptoms.
Lastly, the current approach to addressing withdrawal issues is to request further research to determine which subgroup of patients will require longer tapers. We would like to advocate for a preventive approach akin to the one we adopt when getting into our cars. We fasten our seat belts, even though they are seldom used. We do this, and have made it obligatory, because we know it saves a number of lives each year. A similar approach could be adopted for tapering, by empowering patients and doctors to always opt for gradual tapers based on shared decision-making.
[1]
21 June 2023
P.C. Groot
researcher, person with lived experience
P.C. Groot
Re: The government has a moral duty to help those harmed by prescribed dependence forming drugs
Dear Editor,
I agree with the article’s assessment of the problem of prescribed drug dependence and withdrawal in the UK. It is a serious problem that has been neglected for too long. I am particularly concerned about the lack of support services for patients who have been harmed by taking their medication as prescribed.
I was ahead of the curve on this issue when, in 2016, I identified a potential over-prescription of opioids to patients at my practice. I conducted a review of opioid use to reduce addiction rates and slashed prescriptions by educating patients on pain management. This earned me a shortlist place at the prestigious General Practice Awards.
I believe that a major effort should be made to avoid the inappropriate initiation of these drugs in the first place. This means being more selective about who is prescribed them, and ensuring that patients are fully informed of the risks of dependence and withdrawal.
In addition, there is an urgent need for more support services for patients who have been harmed by these drugs. This should include a national helpline, as well as local services that can provide practical and emotional support.
I urge the UK government to take action on this issue. It is a matter of clinical and moral obligation to help those who have been harmed by taking their medication as prescribed.
Thank you for the opportunity to comment on this important issue.
Competing interests: No competing interests
annie says
The very sordid ‘background’ of Simon Wessely and Wendy Burn…
Royal College of Psychiatrists:
“Necessary redactions have been made”
A month before I resigned from the Royal College of Psychiatrists I made a Subject Access Request asking for College communications that involved me to be released. At the beginning of this month I recieved a large bundle of printed material from the College that exceeded 300 sides of A4.
https://holeousia.com/in-the-world/a-sunshine-act-for-scotland/pe01651-prescribed-drug-dependence-and-withdrawal/royal-college-of-psychiatrists-necessary-redactions-have-been-made/
Of this material supplied by the College 93 A4 sides had been COMPLETELY redacted and another 94 sides had everything redacted other than a subject heading, date, and/or partial address list [in other words NO content was provided].
Of the remaining material 32 A4 sides were full copies of my communications over the years with the College in relation to ethics, transparency of competing interests, and realistic medicine.
This is an example of one of the pages that was not fully redacted by the Royal College of Psychiatrists:
Seroxat – Taken on Trust
Simon Wessely dropped numerous major clangers over the years, in print, on radio and tv, and then slithered away, but, Wendy Burn is continuous, with really nothing to gain.
recovery&renewal Retweeted
1 hr
Kindly #deprescribe — taper psychiatric drugs
@Altostrata
This was from the 2001 Paxil [paroxetine] withdrawal lawsuit. Lead plaintiff’s attorney later told me the class action eventually had 40K members. One result was withdrawal warning being put on antidepressants in December 2001. Suit settled years later.
https://amp.theguardian.com/society/2001/sep/06/mentalhealth
GlaxoSmithKline insists there is no problem with its drug. “There is absolutely no reliable scientific evidence that Paxil is addictive or leads to dependence,” said a spokesman.
Let’s remind ourselves.
Donald Schell obliterated his entire family and the Case was Won, in 2001.
Steward Dolin threw himself under a train.
Numerous, numerous others.
And now we have Yoko and Vincent; Romain, 16 years, death from Paroxetine:
https://acopav.com/romain-16-years-old/
I don’t know about you, but deaths from Seroxat/Paroxetine deserve a new GSK court case, as does the Royal College of Psychiatrists, deserve a Court Case…
Sistem Informasi says
Lest anyone think there is a cosy club here, Maryanne and I fell out over a decade ago about the best way to cover issues like this.
annie says
The tide…
Antidepressants, dependence, and chemical imbalance
24th June
https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/23607752.antidepressants-dependence-chemical-imbalance/
By Helen McArdle
They were once considered a wonder drug for anxiety, stress and insomnia.
READ MORE: Scots psychiatrist says Royal College ‘gaslighted’ him in antidepressant row
As prescriptions for benzodiazepines boomed in the 1960s some of the best known brands, such as Valium and Ativan, became household names immortalised as “mother’s little helper” in a song by the Rolling Stones.
By 1979, around 30 million prescriptions for these tranquilisers were being issued in the UK – but the evidence was mounting that they may not be the panacea they first appeared.
As early as 1968 the Journal of the American Medical Association observed that a number of psychiatric patients had become suicidal after only a few days’ use, and noted how the condition of others worsened when they came off the treatment.
By 1982, Britain’s Medical Research Council (MRC) in Britain was recommending that large-scale studies be undertaken to examine the long-term impact of benzodiazepines after research by a leading psychiatrist showed brain shrinkage in some patients similar to the effects of long-term alcohol abuse.
Critics described the drugs as “worse to withdraw from than heroin” and a “medical disaster akin to Thalidomide”.
READ MORE: Campaigners beg MSPs to tackle the ‘health scandal’ of prescription pill harm
It was against the spectre of abuse and dependence that doctors welcomed the arrival of a new class of antidepressant in the 1980s which were widely considered to be safe and non-addictive – just as ‘benzos’ had once replaced barbiturates.
Today, selective-serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) are the most commonly used form of antidepressants but, as a Panorama documentary this week highlighted, there are signs that history was soon repeating itself.
A confidential Pfizer memo leaked to the programme showed that the drug company, which manufactured the antidepressant Zoloft (sertraline), had been aware that some patients were exhibiting signs of dependence back in 1996.
In a document written ahead of a meeting with Norwegian regulators in 1996, officials for the pharmaceutical giant noted that “we should not volunteer to describe the withdrawal symptoms but have an agreed list prepared in case they insist”.
These included “sensory disturbances, sweating, insomnia, nausea, agitation, anxiety”.
By 1998, Harvard medical school researchers were raising the alarm after their own research found that more than 60% of patients who took sertraline or paroxetine (brand name Seroxat) for between four months to two years would experience withdrawal symptoms after stopping, including severe and lasting harm in a small group of patients.
For some it was easier to stay on the medication permanently than suffer the side effects of trying to stop.
READ MORE: Scots psychiatrist says Royal College ‘gaslighted’ him in antidepressant row
Despite these red flags, the message from psychiatry over the next 20 years remained that withdrawal from antidepressants was “mild, self-limiting and tends to resolve over a week”.
For many patients that will have been the case, and for many others the benefits of taking them have been nothing short of life-saving.
But it is also true that campaigners who tried to draw attention to a darker side of antidepressants were shouted down, dismissed, or accused of “pill-shaming”.
Doctors, psychiatrists and academics – sometimes speaking out only after direct, personal experience of withdrawal – were gaslit as cranks or met with outright hostility.
All too often questioning the efficacy of antidepressants was conflated with diminishing the seriousness of depression itself as an illness.
Yet a growing number of patients and medical professionals – including here in Scotland – refused to be silenced.
A petition to the Scottish Parliament in 2017 – backed by the BMA and mental health charities – called (without success) for the creation of dedicated support services for people struggling with dependence on prescription pills, including antidepressants.
Harrowing personal testimonies described everything from a loss of sexual function and constant “brain zaps” to feelings of “profound terror” and suicidality.
Some had been prescribed the drugs for mild social anxiety only to be plunged into psychosis during withdrawal, even if they spent months gradually tapering down the dose.
READ MORE: Scotland’s secret ‘addicts’ – the patients hooked on antidepressants, and harmed by withdrawal
The goalposts only really shifted in 2020 when the UK’s Royal College of Psychiatrists finally conceded that withdrawal could be a significant problem for a small minority and issued updated patient guidance set out more detailed steps on how to stop.
Plenty of questions remain, however, including the ongoing controversy over the “chemical imbalance” theory.
The problem is that no one knows exactly what causes depression or why, for some, SSRIs work.
Nonetheless, the idea that they reverse low levels of serotonin in the brain took hold in the 1980s and half of all the SSRI patient leaflets approved by the UK medicines regulator still promote the message that the drugs “help to correct certain chemical imbalances in the brain that are causing the symptoms of your illness”.
This was contested by a review published in the Nature journal Molecular Psychiatry in July 2022, which claimed there was “no consistent evidence” that low levels of serotonin cause depression.
As scientific papers go, it caused something of a sensation; to date it has been downloaded more than one million times.
The debate is far from settled, however.
On June 16, a group of 36 experts put their names to a comment in rebuttal – also published in Molecular Psychiatry – which accuses the previous paper of being “methodologically flawed”, presenting “no new analysis”, and ignoring “basic facts regarding the pharmacology of serotonin receptors”.
Professor Alan Young, its co-lead author and head of academic psychiatry at King’s College London, insisted that the chemical imbalance theory had only ever been “a simplistic view to explain how brain changes occur in depression in a more accessible way”.
He added: “Any criticism of the chemical imbalance theory truly misunderstands why it was developed and used by researchers and clinicians.
“Nevertheless, brain changes do occur in the brain of depressed people, including changes in serotonin, and thus the conclusion that this 2022 umbrella review reaches are incorrect.”
For the million or so Scots currently taking antidepressants, however, none of this solves the even knottier question of ‘what is the alternative?’.
But if history has taught us anything, it will probably be a new pill.
The tide
https://holeousia.com/2023/06/25/the-tide/
Here is a selection of material relevant to the prescribing of antidepressants in Scotland over recent years:
Peter’s movie…
annie says
August 2023
John Read
@ReadReadj
·
18m
Our latest survey: what antidepressant users expect from prescribers.
@joannamoncrieff@markhoro@MITUKteam@Mad_In_America@Institute_PDW@Altostrata@JDaviesPhD@jf_moore@MarnieWedlake@PCGroot@PGtzsche1@CEP_UK@dranneguy
The need for antidepressant withdrawal support services: Recommendations from 708 patients
Read John a, Lewis Stevie b, Horowitz Mark c, Moncrieff Joanna d
What is striking when reading the survey responses is how angry, frustrated, disappointed, and let down people feel (Theme 4; Table 5). These feelings came from being disbelieved by their prescriber that they were in withdrawal to their own disbelief at the lack of accurate information provided to them and the poor level of care they were given once they became ill with withdrawal symptoms.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0165178123002536
It would be helpful, however, if the Royal Colleges of Psychiatrists and General Practitioners would take institutional responsibility for actively disseminating the information.
Meanwhile, however, doctors, their professional bodies, politicians, health service managers and insurance companies around the world continue to ignore the suffering of, quite literally, millions of people. One partial exception is the UK, where the Royal College of Psychiatrists, after considerable pressure, published a helpful and broadly accurate position statement in 2019, followed, as mentioned, by some excellent information sheets aimed at the public (RCP, 2020), however, they have neglected to educate psychiatrists or GPs.
Mightn’t that, have been a good idea…
susanne says
Patrick D Hahn from Patrick D Hahn Unsubscribe
1:20 PM (4 hours ago)
The Emperor Has No Clothes
PATRICK D HAHN
JUN 25
Here’s an article from the HART Group summarizing the overwhelming evidence that the likelihood of contracting COVID-19 INCREASES with the number of boosters.
We already knew the jabs CAUSE covid in the first 9-21 days after administration. Public Health England, the Danish Ministry of Health, the BMJ, and the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE) all have stipulated this.
Thanks for reading Patrick D Hahn! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.
So you’re giving people a preparation known to INCREASE the rate of covid infection in the first few days after administration, but those cases don’t count. We also know the claimed “effectiveness” of the jabs wanes rapidly. It could be that the “effectiveness” was just a statistical mirage created by not counting the cases that arose in the first few days after the shot.
Now we know that the more jabs you have, the MORE likely you are to contract covid, and why would anybody have thought otherwise? Each time you get a booster shot, you are forcing your body to produce presumably the exact same quantity of the toxic spike protein, in effect training your immune system to ignore it. This is the basis for desensitization therapy for allergies.
And this was not a harmless mistake. Families were torn apart, people were fired from their jobs, and service members were discharged mid-career all for refusing the shot.
Not to mention the deaths caused by withholding safe and effective medicines proven to keep covid patients alive and out of hospital, all so they could get that Emergency Use Authorization.
Not to mention the damage done by lockdowns, school and business closures, fear-mongering, muzzling of children, and all the other measures intended to break the will of the populace, crush their spirit, so they would agree to having ANYTHING shot into their veins. We will be dealing with the fallout from all this for decades to come.
The whole idea of an Emergency Use Authorization for vaccines is unutterably fatuous, anyway. The Emergency Use Authorization was intended for people suffering from deadly diseases, who were so desperate they were willing to try anything. It is not supposed to be for a product mandated to go into the veins of hundreds of millions of healthy people.
These people hate us. I will never trust them again.
My book The Day the Science Died: Covid Vaccines and the Power of Fear is now available on amazon.
annie says
BBC R4 Today
Plug for RSV Vaccines ‘in pregnancy’
with Professor Andrew Pollard
2.41
[https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m001n8bs]
Bivalent Prefusion F Vaccine in Pregnancy to Prevent RSV Illness in Infants
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2216480
CONCLUSIONS
RSVpreF vaccine administered during pregnancy was effective against medically attended severe RSV-associated lower respiratory tract illness in infants, and no safety concerns were identified. (Funded by Pfizer; MATISSE ClinicalTrials.gov number, NCT04424316.)
Albert Bourla
@AlbertBourla
It’s been an encouraging couple of days in the world of respiratory health.
@CDCgov ’s #ACIP has voted to recommend our RSV vaccine for adults ≥60yo (https://on.pfizer.com/3phSUN3), and our pneumococcal conjugate vaccine for infants and children (https://on.pfizer.com/3pnydzh). These decisions are an important step as we continue working to help people protect themselves and their loved ones from respiratory diseases.
2:27 PM · Jun 23, 2023
‘Hang on a second’ …
‘Nearly ready to go’ …
Only Pfizer is testing a vaccine to protect newborns.
https://www.sciencenews.org/article/vaccines-antibodies-rsv-virus
ahead of an FDA meeting to discuss the vaccine’s approval in August, she said…
annie says
Swifts flying overhead…
“Please avoid •alarming claims without data”
louis appleby
@ProfLAppleby
·
2h
Misleading & potentially harmful. Please avoid •alarming claims without data •attributing suicide to something people in distress may identify with. Cost of living crisis carries risks but we are not so far seeing a rise in national figures. #suicideprevention
CrimeGirl ©
@CrimeGirI
·
Jun 26
Someone threw themselves in front of a train today and died. The train company employee I spoke to told me that there has been a notable increase of people doing this over the past couple of weeks, and they think it is down to the cost of living crisis and mortgages rising again.
1:49 PM · Jun 27, 2023
https://twitter.com/ProfLAppleby/status/1673674965906751496
“- those are data. Why do you seek to shut down a debate that is of public concern?”
louis appleby
@ProfLAppleby
·
Jun 24
My garden isn’t #WorthyFarm & my iPhone isn’t the pyramid stage but enjoying #Glasto just the same. Summer evening in S Manchester, swifts flying overhead.
https://holeousia.com/2023/06/26/has-not-left-the-building/
‘Crime girl’ …
annie says
recovery&renewal Retweeted
AntiDepAware
@AntiDepAware
“We visited a private psychiatrist who, from the first session, prescribed #Paroxetine. The psychiatrist never alerted us to the possible side effects of the drug, including the increased risk of suicide in adolescents.” (Paroxetine = Paxil = Seroxat)
https://www.antidepressantrisks.org/stolen-lives/romain
History of Romain. Died by suicide, under medication by paroxetine and tercian.
By his father. September 4, 2022.
Katinka Blackford Newman
https://www.antidepressantrisks.org/team
Antidepressants Risks
Stolen Lives
chris says
Conversion of the Inquiry to statutory status, 28 June 2023
Statement from Dr Geraldine Strathdee, 28 June 2023
“Today the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, Steve Barclay, announced that the Essex Mental Health Independent Inquiry will be granted statutory status under the Inquiries Act 2005.”
What do you reckon Annie, Susanne ?
susanne says
More bluff and fluff Chris
Statement from Dr Geraldine Strathdee, 28 June 2023
Today, the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, Steve Barclay, announced that
the Essex Mental Health Independent Inquiry will be granted statutory status under the
Inquiries Act 2005. I requested these powers for the Inquiry from the Secretary of State
for Health and Social Care, and I whole heartedly welcome this news.
I am confident that statutory status will allow the Inquiry to deliver a full and robust report
and make recommendations that will lead to much needed improvements.
While I remain dedicated to the cause of the Inquiry, I have taken the very difficult
decision to hand over the role of Chair. In my view the next stage of the Inquiry’s work
requires a Chair who is available for the entire forward duration of a statutory Inquiry.
Due to personal health reasons, I have decided with my family, that this cannot be me.
In my role as Chair, I have been deeply honoured by the courage and trust of so many
families and witnesses who shared their accounts with the EMHII team and me. I’ve been
personally deeply touched by the experiences shared by those who have lost loved ones
and have been mental health inpatients themselves. While I have spent my lifelong
career working to improve mental health services, it has been a humbling opportunity to
hear directly from those affected about what changes need to be made and I am inspired
by the thoughtful insights and practical recommendations for improvements they have
made. I will now take all of this learning to a new a Chair – and handover the great
privilege of leading this Inquiry.
I want to take this opportunity to thank each and every one of the Inquiry’s witnesses and
all of those who have been in touch to share their views and evidence. I also want to
thank my committed and professional team, in them, I know I am leaving the Inquiry in
safe hands.
I will be ever thankful to have had the opportunity to serve as Chair to this Inquiry.
chris says
bluff and fluff indeed ! They will not allow the truth to be told to the general public – it’s off the charts horrific.
annie says
The Story so far, and the aim for “World-Class Treatment” – No Chair…
“Propel a revolution in culture…
“Gone are the days of isolating those with mental illness or treating them with brutality and contempt…
In December last year, the inquiry’s chair, Dr Geraldine Strathdee, said she had received information identifying up to 2,000 people who may have died.
This figure has been disputed by the current provider of mental health services, the Essex Partnership University NHS Trust (EPUT).
Essex mental health deaths inquiry given legal powers
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-essex-66044321
She said less than 30%, whom she described as “essential witnesses”, had agreed to attend evidence sessions.
Welcoming the government’s announcement, she said: “I am confident that statutory status will allow the inquiry to deliver a full and robust report and make recommendations that will lead to much needed improvements.”
Dr Strathdee also announced she was stepping down as chair due to health reasons.
Marjorie Wallace, chief executive of mental health charity SANE, said the alleged failings that led to the inquiry were not confined to Essex.
She said: “This inquiry is the country’s largest investigation into mental health services and the findings will not be unique to Essex. It should act as a catalyst in improving mental health care and propel a revolution in culture.”
https://www.itv.com/news/anglia/2023-06-28/inquiry-into-2000-mental-health-deaths-is-given-new-powers
She had called for the extra powers after revealing that just 11 staff members out of 14,000 who were contacted by the inquiry said they would attend an evidence session.
https://www.halsteadgazette.co.uk/news/23620685.melanie-leahy-issues-statement-essex-mental-health-inquiry-update/
“Inquiries such as these are the only way in which lessons can be learnt for the future to ensure that no other families have to suffer the same fate.
“Providing legal advice free of charge in cases such as these can often be the only way to help families get the justice they deserve, and we are proud of our work on this case.”
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/government-acts-to-improve-patient-safety-in-mental-health-care
Health and Social Care Secretary Steve Barclay said:
Everyone receiving care in a mental health facility should feel safe and be confident they’re receiving world-class treatment.
The Secretary of State has further announced that in October a new Health Services Safety Investigations Body will be formally established and will commence a national investigation into mental health inpatient care settings.
Evidence and views for the rapid review were taken from over 300 experts in mental health inpatient pathways, including carers, nurses, psychiatrists, data experts, clinical directors and people with recent personal experience of using – or caring for someone who uses – mental health care services.
Louis appleby Retweeted
Steve Barclay
@SteveBarclay
·
Jun 28
Anyone receiving care in a mental health facility should feel safe. The inquiry into tragic deaths of mental health inpatients in Essex will become a public inquiry. A national investigation into mental health inpatient services will launch this autumn.
https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/steve-barclay-mental-health-children-scandal-b2365771.html
To the mums and dads with teenagers in mental health units: I’m taking action to help your child
There will be a public inquiry into the tragic deaths of mental health inpatients at NHS trusts across Essex, writes the health secretary Steve Barclay
https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/steve-barclay-mental-health-children-scandal-b2365771.html
Throughout history, mental illness has frequently been misunderstood. From the enforced social isolation of the Middle Ages to the abhorrent asylums of the Victorian era, those suffering could too often feel there was no way out and no care available.
Thankfully, we’ve made much progress in our approach and are rightly working to remove the taboo around mental illness and treat those suffering with dignity, kindness and professionalism.
One in four people will experience a mental health issue at some stage of their lives, and over a million people will seek treatment this year. That treatment must be of the highest standard. That’s why I’ve confirmed the current inquiry into the tragic deaths of mental health inpatients at NHS trusts across Essex will become a public inquiry.
This inquiry was established to seek answers, transparency, and accountability. But, in its current form, it’s facing too many challenges as it carries out vital work to unearth the circumstances around these deaths and learn the lessons of the past.
Former and current staff must assist with its work, but too few are coming forward. Their evidence is vital to ensuring no more patients or their families experience the tragedy of losing a loved one in care. A public inquiry will have the necessary legal powers to compel those witnesses to come forward.
However, this isn’t limited to Essex. To the mums and dads with teenage children in mental health units, to the patients across the country seeking support close to where they live, and to those worried about the way such facilities are staffed – I can tell you I’m taking action on a national level.
I will task a new investigative body with launching an investigation into our country’s mental health inpatient care facilities. This investigation will be wide-ranging and will help us tackle inappropriate out-of-area placements, improve care for young people with mental health needs, develop safer staffing models, and learn from tragic deaths.
I’d like to thank The Independent for raising awareness of this important issue. We listened to the concerns and launched a rapid review into how we can improve the way data, complaints, feedback and whistleblowing alerts are used to identify safety risks in mental health inpatient settings.
Today, we also published the findings of that review, which will help trusts and providers nationwide identify ways of providing safer care.
This is an opportune time to extend my gratitude to Dr Geraldine Strathdee who has overseen the work of the Essex inquiry and the rapid review, bringing with her a wealth of experience and expertise. Dr Strathdee will be stepping down from her position as chair of the inquiry for personal reasons, but we will announce a new chair as soon as possible.
https://twitter.com/ProfLAppleby/status/1670002486566965248
Carmine M. Pariante
@ParianteLab
·
Jun 17
Amazing!
Karen
@Lesley5856
·
Jun 18
Mental health care is in crisis, suicides on the increase, please explain this award ???
A Wing and a Prayer…
chris says
“The Secretary of State has further announced that in October a new Health Services Safety Investigations Body will be formally established and will commence a national investigation into mental health inpatient care settings.”
“The Secretary of State has further announced that in October a new Health Services Safety Investigations Body will be formally established and will commence a national investigation into mental health inpatient care settings.”
If they would like the evidence – the ‘Health’ Trusts own documents listing the drugs – I have of a consultant lying about the polypharmacy – olanzapine, zopiclone, diazepam, mirtazapine – at night all at once he subjected me to. I wonder would they do anything about it or ignor it ala CQC and PHSO or dismiss it as the Nursing and Midwifery Council did and get a lawyer to tell me not to contact them again when I tried to tell them what akathisia is.
tim says
Is it too much to hope that any inquiry might lead to the end of misdiagnosed adverse drug reactions (ADRs) to psychotropic drugs resulting in iatrogenic injury and people with no mental illness being wrongfully detained in cruel and abusive “healthcare facilities”?
How can an institution devoid of empathy be called a ‘hospital’?
“Lessons will be learned”!
It would be an invaluable lesson learned if primary and secondary care prescribers meticulously achieved Fair, Full and Informed Consent before prescribing drugs causing changes in thoughts feelings, emotions and behaviour which are subsequently, serially misdiagnosed as ‘psychotic depression’, ‘bipolar disorder’, schizoaffective disorder, schizophrenia, borderline personality disorder et al.
Once these erroneous labels are applied (‘Serious Mental Illness’ – Labels for Life) the prescription drug-injured person is wrongfully detained and forcibly further drugged with cavalier regard for resultant brain and systemic, life-changing injuries.
Is there any possibility that minimal dosing for minimum duration, psychotropic drug use might become the lesson learned; “The action taken to help your child”?
Might we learn watchful waiting and honest, accurate observation prior to enforced drugging? ( MICLO – Masterly Inactivity and Cat-Like Observation – often served patients well in other medical disciplines).
Professionalism demands commitment to skilled differential diagnosis. It must be a foremost priority to ask oneself as a diagnostician: Is this an ADR such as a toxic delusion / involuntary intoxication and not ‘a psychosis’?
How can any patient with akathisia, disinhibition and emotional blunting be afforded accuracy in differential diagnosis once their akathisia has been ‘treated’ with for example Olanzapine and Fluoxetine?
“Anyone receiving care in a mental health facility should feel safe”.
Yes indeed, safe from incompetent misdiagnosis and safe from psychotropic induced drug injury and death.
Dr. David Healy says
This is spot on the money Tim
We need some journalists to ‘get’ it
otherwise any enquiry will just brush things under the carpet
David
tim says
Thank you Dr. Healy.
If there are any journalists known to you who may be receptive, I would be delighted if they could read these concerns. My background information might also be shared (if relevant) although I have to request anonymity having experienced what appears to have been possible family medical rejection and retribution.
I fear that an inquiry that searches for missed ligature points and interrupted observation of patients at risk may miss the opportunity to investigate the fundamental failure to prevent common psychotropic drug ADRs causing serious injury and death.
It would seem impossible to ‘learn lessons’ unless misdiagnosis of ADRs as Serious Mental Illness is recognised, audited and subject to a commitment to accept identified error/s, to acknowledge diagnostic failure/s to the patient, their family and G.P. then apologise, and record in the case notes. In short, address The Duty of Candour.
This would constitute a genuine commitment “to treat those suffering with dignity, kindness and professionalism”.
annie says
Tim, anonymous…
Why I live in fear that my name will be disclosed
By Anonymous
July 2, 2023
Should I take a personal risk on that hope, or remain in the shadows and perhaps damage the credibility of the projects I am involved in? This conflict, between doing the right thing and the personal risk it would expose me to, keeps me awake at night.
It really should not be like this, Ms Hayes, in a free and democratic society. The report stands or falls on its merit, not on the name or status of the authors.
https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/why-i-live-in-fear-that-my-name-will-be-disclosed/
This report has been co-authored by a multidisciplinary team of experts from various fields including medicine, safety management and pharmaceutical regulation. Its purpose is to bring to the attention of politicians and policy makers the serious shortcomings in the current regulatory system for drug approvals in general and the Covid-19 vaccines in particular, and the significant safety issues that result. In order to ensure the focus remains on the content of this work rather than on individual authors, the team have decided to remain anonymous at present.
https://www.hartgroup.org/perseus/
Do you think the Perseus ‘Complex’, is stronger or weaker from being Anonymous?
tim says
Thank you Annie.
Not only do we have experience of unnecessary psychotropic drugging and resultant life-changing injuries demonstrate to us that Primum non Nocere had been disregarded via
incompetent psychiatric misdiagnosis of ADRs to psychotropic drugs: We are not free to speak out as we would wish to try to prevent such harm to others.
President Roosevelt’s Four Freedoms Speech of 1941 appears to be negated for those injured and killed by the alleged excessive and ill-judged (MIS)-USE of these drugs.
We do not have Freedom of Speech in the medical journals and medical press.
Neither can those who’s lives have been destroyed, nor their betrayed families ever have Freedom From Fear with regard to the ever-present risk of further misdiagnosis and further enforced drugging
Perhaps a Fifth Freedom might have been addressed? Freedom From Wrongful Detention.
chris says
How can any patient with akathisia, disinhibition and emotional blunting be afforded accuracy in differential diagnosis once their akathisia has been ‘treated’ with for example Olanzapine and Fluoxetine?
Yes that is what happens, and they usually throw in a few more.
susanne says
The same thing goes on in psych institutions I have no idea of the numbers But most of these elders will have been given psych drugs some of which can bring on psychosis – that’s how a friend with mild dementia was ‘treated’ years ago on an elderly ward in a general hospital- still goes on. Her file which I was refused access to would have said she was psychotic and treated appropriately – the psychiatrist refused to say what she had been injected with. She could not speak was dribbling and had stiff movements causing massive distress. We got her out of there but many people are unable to do that and psychs and their assistants able to compulsorily detain – ‘for their own safety.’ which shuts up their victims.
May be worth trying to link up with Geraint Lewis?
ITV News
Caught on hidden cameras – yet just 1% of care home abuse ends in charges
Westminster Producer
This video contains distressing images
How many more vulnerable people are suffering in care homes? Geraint Vincent reports
Ann King’s children were horrified when they reviewed footage from the hidden camera they had installed in their mum’s bedroom – and immediately rang the police.
It clearly showed the dementia patient, 88, had been subjected to a distressing catalogue of abuse at the care home in Surrey they were paying £8,000 a month to look after her.
Staff at Reigate Grange had mocked, teased, and manhandled Ann. They’d made lewd gestures, flickered light switches to confuse her, and left her struggling on the floor for nearly an hour.
But despite all this evidence captured on camera, Ann’s abusers were never charged with a crime. The case was among over 1,000 allegations of abuse or neglect at care homes last year which did not result in criminal charges.
Freedom of information (FOI) requests by ITV News to police forces in England and Wales have revealed a charge rate of just 1.4% for allegations of this kind.
The 16 forces which responded told us they had received 1,080 allegations in 2022 – but just 16 charges were made.
And the problem is likely to be much more widespread, given the majority of the 43 forces in England and Wales said they were unable to respond to our request for information.
The ‘revenge evictions’ leaving care home residents homeless
The ‘revenge’ takes all kinds of forms of abuse in institutions including drugging with ‘antipsychotics’
chris says
Neuroleptics are a crime against humanity and only used to shut people up – chemical cosh and given to everyone in a psych hospital. To call the drugs medications is utterly abhorrent. As you probably know there is talk of them being given to Children in the UK
Dr. David Healy says
Chris
This is wrong. These drugs can be very helpful. The fault rarely lies in the drugs – it lies in the people using them and their motives and incentives
D
chris says
People in psych hospitals don’t have a choice they are forced to take them. 400mg of quetiapine for sleep or anxiety is a crime. If any member of the public were to take the minumum dose of a neuroleptic they will never voluntarily do it again – the experience is utterly dreadful.
Dr. David Healy says
Chris
You are absolutely right about this. But again its not the drug per se. Its the staff and the situation. If as part of the training of all staff, they were forced to undergo what they do to patients, we might see more understanding. Some of the earlier comments in this sequence bring this point home.
You at least have managed to bring some good out of the crisis the system gave you – it looks like your suggestion of Pyridoxal-5-Phosphate (recent post) definitely helps some.
I know a good journalist who wants to look at this issue – anyone reading these comments, who has an experience of their mental health care going badly wrong and how they escaped from the system, should get in touch and we may be able to bring this to wider attention.
David
annie says
‘Spot’ on the money…
It was “Got”
Coroner calls for inquiry into Seroxat
Sarah Boseley, health editor
Thu 13 Mar 2003
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2003/mar/13/mentalhealth.medicineandhealth
Seroxat, the world’s biggest-selling antidepressant, should be withdrawn while its safety is fully investigated, advises a coroner who recorded an open verdict on a man who killed himself within a fortnight of starting a course of the drug.
The Brecon coroner, Geraint Williams, said he would be writing to the Department of Health about his finding that Seroxat led to Colin Whitfield, 56, a retired headteacher, taking his own life.
“I have grave concerns that this is a dangerous drug that should be withdrawn until at least detailed national studies are undertaken,” he told the court on Tuesday.
“It is my intention to write to the Department of Health and to the secretary of state to ask him to hold an urgent inquiry into Seroxat and consider whether it should be withdrawn from sale in the UK.
“I am profoundly disturbed by the effect this drug had on Colin Whitfield.”
Evidence indicated that Mr Whitfield suffered a change of personality after starting to take the drug.
Seroxat, whose generic name is paroxetine, is in the class of drugs, with Prozac, termed SSRI or selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors. It has overtaken Prozac in sales. Both drugs are prescribed mainly by GPs. There have been several strongly contested legal cases in the US against makers of SSRIs after suicides among those taking the drugs over a couple of weeks, or even days.
Almost two years ago, the former SmithKline Beecham (now GlaxoSmithKline) was ordered by a Wyoming jury to pay £4.7m to the family of Donald Schell, who killed his wife, daughter, baby grand daughter and then himself after two days on Seroxat – known as Paxil in the US.
In that case, evidence was given by a British psychopharmacologist, David Healy, the director of the North Wales department of psychological medicine, who was granted access to GlaxoSmithKline’s archives. He found that a small number of volunteers in perfect health, who took part in early trials of the drug, had become very agitated or suicidal.
Dr Healy has given evidence to a number of coroners’ inquests in the UK, including that over Mr Whitfield’s death.
“A lot of people going into the inquest just know the person would not have committed suicide in the normal course of events. You get a sense of their utter bewilderment,” he said.
Most coroners did not know about the controversy. Dr Healy wrote to 148 coroners in England and Wales, and also to the review of coroner services, which was set up after the Harold Shipman case.
Dr Healy advises that statistics on deaths of people on SSRIs be centrally collected.
He has also pointed out that suicide verdicts – which could be wrong in cases concerning the antidepressant – deprive relatives of insurance payouts.
GlaxoSmithKline insists the drug is safe, saying its experience with Seroxat involves “thousands of physicians, millions of patients and over 10 years of experience world-wide”. It states that there is “no valid scientific research finding that Seroxat causes suicidal thoughts or acts”.
Last year, the medicines control agency announced a review of Seroxat after growing concern about withdrawal symptoms and side effects.
Colin Whitfield, 56, was a retired headmaster. His wife Kathryn told Brecon coroner’s court that he had never shown any inclination towards suicide.
He was prescribed Seroxat for anxiety, not depression. If his GP had thought he might be a suicide risk, it is likely he would have referred him to a hospital psychiatrist.
She said he was a loving father who would never have wanted to distress his family. Yet last autumn he locked himself in the garden shed and cut both wrists, while one of his daughters was sleeping not far away.
“I don’t believe this was a conscious decision, I don’t think it was an intentional act. There was no way he was in his right mind when he did that,” she said.
“There was no note and no intent. Two days before he died, on his birthday when he was opening presents, he asked, ‘What more can I ask for than my lovely family?’ And on the night before he died he did and said three things that indicated he was planning ahead.”
The suicide “didn’t fit the picture of who he was, and we have no doubt that it was the drug that caused him to do it. He was a very caring, very protective father and husband. He would be hating himself for what he has done to his family.”
Seroxat Update
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/panorama/5346938.stm
Seroxat update
Shelley Jofre gives an update on her investigation into the antidepressant Seroxat. Shelley has currently made three films about the drug.
Seroxat and the other SSRI antidepressants (including Prozac, Lustral and Ciprimil) may provoke violence in a small number of people who take them, according to a paper published today on the Public Library of Science Medicine website.
The study – which focused primarily on Seroxat – looked at clinical trial data and reports of adverse effects and found possible links between SSRI antidepressants and violent behaviour.
Back in October 2002, Panorama broadcast Secrets of Seroxat.
T
his film included the disturbing claim that Seroxat had thrown one man into a state of mental turmoil which led him to kill himself and three members of his family.
We also uncovered evidence that the antidepressant was addictive, that it could make some adults self-harm and become suicidal and that clinical trials had shown that these effects were also possible in children who took the drug.
Seroxat’s manufacturer, GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) vigorously denied each of these claims at the time and still continued to defend its best-selling drug in two subsequent programmes that we made on the subject.
Gradually though, over the last four years we have been proved right on each of the claims we made in the original programme.
May 2003
GSK drops the claim you cannot become addicted to Seroxat” from Seroxat packs.
June 2003
The medicines’ regulator bans Seroxat and other SSRIs (except Prozac) for use in under-18s after clinical trials results link them with increase in self harm.
December 2004
Government Expert Working Group recommends careful monitoring for suicide in 18-30 year olds on SSRIs.
August 2005
Norwegian study links Seroxat to increased risk of suicide attempts in adults.
May 2006
GSK’s own review of clinical trial data reveals increase in suicide attempts in 18-30 year olds taking Seroxat.
September 2006
Study suggests possible links between SSRIs and violent behaviour.
Thu 14 Jun 2001
It’s time we had proper, open trials on the Prozac family of antidepressants
https://www.theguardian.com/education/2001/jun/14/highereducation.uk
How would Mr Hudson even be able to blame alcohol for making someone drunk?
So what does Mr Hudson think? As always, the MCA declined to answer detailed questions.
It will be interesting to know what they conclude – if they deign to tell us. The MCA will have been supplied with all the healthy volunteer data before it granted the licence for Seroxat. It doesn’t seem to have been worried then, which makes one wonder who, exactly, was steering them as to what it meant.
Sarah Boseley is the former health editor of the Guardian, where she was for 37 years.
Sarah has written extensively about GlaxoSmithKline, for well nearly 25 years.
My Doctors did not inform me about the 4.5-year MHRA investigation in to Seroxat; I was left to find it for myself.
https://jme.bmj.com/content/35/2/107
Swallowing the company line…
chris says
John Virapen talking about a small trial he did on Prozac…
Never talk side effects
What was that, the last one, the English to German translator asks – you can guess what he can’t pronounce
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Eet4x5_8tE&t=373s
susanne says
Thanks for this Chris The video ended at ‘he was the vice president in London’…..no name given. Do you know who ‘he’ was? Why just cut his name out I wonder?
chris says
Susanne – that was 4 of 7 here is
5 of 7
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WiziQAkeoBY
The rest is here
https://www.youtube.com/@JohnVirapen
annie says
Mirror, mirror, on the wall…
https://twitter.com/ClaireCNWL/status/1675141068994560001
Reflected in a mirror, middle-aged man looks on anxiously, in his pyjamas and rubber slippers, the usual dress of a psychiatric patient, as doctors look on, and wonder about their ‘arsenal of antidepressants’ as possibly helpful…
Chelsea fan’s wife, puts pen to paper, to talk about anxiety in middle-age and older women
https://twitter.com/recover2renew/status/1675447184538345472
If you can’t read small print, ‘arsenal of antidepressants’
https://www.pressreader.com/uk/the-mail-on-sunday/20230702/282591677389905
“Anxiety-ridden women” and “Arsenal of Antidepressants”
Let’s encourage even more prescribing, shall we?
chris says
So now it’s lady Wessely plus she’s a professor. There’s not a chance the truth is coming out.
annie says
Panorama’s Prescription…
What have we learned?
louis appleby
@ProfLAppleby
Getting closer to new national #suicideprevention strategy. What have we learned?
Suicide rates since 1st strategy in 2002 have been lowest on record. But no change since 2018 – we need new impetus.
Big drivers of suicide are economy, isolation, alcohol, mental illness. 1/3
https://twitter.com/ProfLAppleby/status/1675593726431838214
King of Kathmandu
@K42627King
·
9h
Still intentionally omitting something Louis?!
Psychotropic drug damage.
Often hidden by you guys behind mental illness.
Your dirty big secrets won’t stay hidden for much longer.
People are beginning to see the fraud and deception of psychiatry.
@BBCPanorama
However, antidepressants can increase agitation and akathisia in young people, and it is possible that this increased agitation could also contribute to an increase in aggressive behaviour.
One thing we do know: antidepressants protect from suicide. The risk of suicide attempt among patients treated with an SSRI is about one-third that of patients who are not treated with an SSRI, and it is two times higher before than after the start of SSRI treatment. Among people who die by suicide, the proportion that die by violent means is lower in those who are taking SSRIs than in those without any detectable blood levels of antidepressants. Most worryingly, when the rates of SSRI prescriptions for children and adolescents decreased after US and European regulatory agencies issued warnings about a possible suicide risk with antidepressant use in paediatric patients, this decrease was associated with an increase in suicide rates. This should raise the concern that any unjustified panic about use of antidepressants might lead to a drop in their prescription, and possibly to an increase in suicide rates. Clearly a more balanced discussion about the safety of antidepressants, without a sensationalist title, is needed.
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanpsy/article/PIIS2215-0366(17)30312-7/fulltext
Carmine Pariante
“However, antidepressants can increase agitation and akathisia in young people, and it is possible that this increased agitation could also contribute to an increase in aggressive behaviour.”
“One thing we do know: antidepressants protect from suicide.”
Dan, Yoko and Vincent, are well aware…
chris says
Also reading that made me remember this – so funny
“I was about to say passionate but I hate the word passionate. I’m passionately against passionate.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X-E1iO3rsVk&t=1353s
chris says
P5P
As well as it’s vital role as a co-factor in the biosynthesis of gamma-Aminobutyric Acid
“vitB6-dependent enzymes are needed for the biosynthesis of at least three important neurotransmitters: epinephrine, dopamine and serotonin.”
6.5 VitB6 and it’s Role in Neurotransmitter Biosynthesis
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6071262/
annie says
Not sure Clare Gerada’s ‘technique’, is universally acknowledged…
recovery&renewal
@recover2renew
“Dr Clare Gerada, a psychiatrist & president of @rcgp , said: ‘Patients absolutely feel worse in the first 3wks. They tend to get very severe #anxiety symptoms. I sometimes prescribe a sleeping tablet in the 1st week to help patients cope with increased #panic at night.”
#WHAT??
https://twitter.com/recover2renew/status/1675830778301755392
Post Drug Syndrome Families (PSSD, PFS, PAS)
@stopharmingus
·
10m
Is this why people become intensely suicidal on antidepressants? Why aren’t GPs warning patients and their families? Why is it ok to completely neglect your professional duty to provide patients with informed consent?
@rcgp @gmcuk
Kindly #deprescribe — taper psychiatric drugs
@Altostrata
·
2h
@EveSimmns
you’re taking diazepam to counter the adverse effects of Prozac?
https://www.mailplus.co.uk/edition/health/mos-health/265618/the-side-effects-of-prozac-made-me-think-i-was-going-mad-but-heres-why-im-still-taking-it
Screenshot
https://twitter.com/recover2renew/status/1675802095667085312/photo/1
Separately, Professor Healy thinks that telling patients that the drugs can take weeks to work could be costing lives — for while your illness might take time to respond, patients should be warned explicitly that they should not feel worse in the interim.
‘An adverse reaction to antidepressants can happen within hours…
chris says
So this is very interesting indeed, they can throw in anxiety, panic attacks, ADHD’ alcoholism and tardive akathisia as well
https://www.cam.ac.uk/research/news/chemical-imbalance-in-the-forebrain-underpins-compulsive-behaviour-and-ocd-study-finds
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-023-38695-z
“Standard MRS scanners can be quite crude, not picking up the glutamate signal very accurately. The 7-Tesla machine allows us to separate the overlapping signals and measure glutamate and GABA more precisely,” said Biria.
Well well well – major interesting!
“The researchers say that raised glutamate levels may prove to be a “biomarker” for OCD. This could guide new therapies, including medication but also non-invasive use of magnetic stimulation through the scalp, an approach which is showing some promise for treatment of OCD.”
“Our findings are a major piece of the puzzle for understanding the mechanisms behind OCD. The results suggest new strategies for medication in OCD based on available drugs that regulate glutamate. In particular, drugs that inhibit presynaptic glutamate receptors,” said Robbins. A presynaptic receptor is the part of a nerve cell that controls release of neurotransmitter chemicals.”
If the 7-Tesla machine is accurate then maybe. The rest of it I disagree with –
“The results suggest new strategies for medication in OCD based on available drugs that regulate glutamate. In particular, drugs that inhibit presynaptic glutamate receptors,”
The body will act against any drug intervention. The only long term solution is to help the body to convert glutamate to gamma-Aminobutyric Acid just give it what it requires Pryidoxal-5-Phosphate, and cut out high glutamate foods.
Do you know Dr Marjan Biria, David ? This is the first time I’m reading about this person for sure they are on the correct track.