Your drug may be your problem

This June , in a basement room in a building on the University of Toronto Campus, the anti psychiatry coalition held a forum on anti-depressant drugs. Two short films were shown; Selling Sickness, originally aired on CBC's The Nature of Things, and Little Helpers, originally aired on CBC's Fifth Estate.

But the more interesting part of the program were the speakers; Don Weitz, a long time anti-psychiatry activist, and Angela Bischoff, the life partner of Tooker Gomberg, the candidate for mayor of Toronto in 2000 who killed himself a year ago last March.

'Ange', as many of us who worked on the Gomberg campaign came to affectionately call her, was to have spoken first. She could not, and had to sit down. Don Weitz spoke. By then Ange was able to speak and what she had to say was worth listening to.

Two members of the audience were able to add greatly to our knowledge as well. One is a practicing naturopathic doctor. The other is a researcher who has studied the effects of the drug Ritalin on children. It damages their DNA.

Further, the researcher said, they are very dependency forming. You cannot just quit them. The rule of thumb is that for every two days you are on them, you must take a day to get off them. For instance, if you have been on a drug for six months, you must take three months to phase yourself off it.

Another important point while summer is here; these drugs can interfere with our body's temperature regulating mechanism.

Don

Weitz said that he had never been on these drugs, called 'selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors' or SSRI's. But he has seen many people injured by them. He says that health Canada does not protect us because it is in a conflict of interest with the drug companies.

The usual reply from health Canada to pressure for a public inquiry goes like; "we are working with Glaxo-Smith-Kline and Wyeth to release an advisory". The 'advisory' usually comes 15 years too late, as with Remeron, the drug Tooker Gomberg was on. For new drugs, clinical trial information is kept secret.

Doctors fail to inform patients that these drugs can be a trigger for suicidal ideas, about other effects, and of the non medical alternatives. This violates the principle of informed consent.

There are lawsuits against Paxil and Prozac in the states, which the manufacturers usually settle out of court. The American president is attempting to stop class action lawsuits to protect drug companies and other corporate interests. There is one law suit pending in Canada, in Hamilton. All the law suits in the United Kingdom have failed, due to the 'different system' there.

Ange

Ange felt able to speak. Some say Tooker Gomberg chose to die, but Ange says it was the drug he took which killed him. He was a text book case of a bad drug reaction.

His first depression was in 2001, at age 46. He was out of commission for a year. Nothing helped, including SSRI's. In 2003, he went into another depression. When he started taking drugs, his friends saw him becoming agitated. Yet his psychiatrist did not perceive it, and never talked to Tooker about self-harm thoughts.

After Tooker's death, Ange had to pressure the doctor to file an adverse drug reaction report. He had never done one and did not know how. Ange is now suing.

But she also spoke of the guilt felt by close friends and family of suicide victims, and of "not letting yourself off the hook". many people will accept that "you did everything you could". Usually, they did not do all they could have done and they should face that. Some members of the audience echoed this very painful truth. Part of the system of social control is the huge pressure placed on people to surrender their own moral responsibilities.

Agitation is a big predictor of suicide and the physiological mechanism is well known. If the patient becomes agitated while on a drug, it is the wrong drug for that p

atient. Normally, adverse reactions to a drug in one of one thousand patients is considered normal, and one in twenty, high. If a drug produces agitation in one of four patients, it is very unreliable.

Every one of the teenagers who have been in the news for shooting up their schools had just started with anti-depressants.

While there is some evidence that these drugs help some people in the short term, there is little evidence of long term benefits. They can cause permanent changes in brain chemistry. Yet forty to fifty million people worldwide are on them. An estimated quarter of a million people world wide have attempted suicide from Prozac alone, and twenty five thousand have succeeded.

There is no evidence that depressed people are suffering serotonin deficiency. It is a theory not based on evidence. When two depressed groups of people in a scientific study are given a pill, one group an an antidepressant and another a placebo, suicide is twice as likely in the group with the drug. Forty percent of the placebo group will improve.

Ange showed us an article in a drug company magazine aimed at doctors. It was about how to keep their patients on drugs. It said nothing about adverse effects.

Ange suggests that the "black box" labeling used on tobacco products be used with these drugs.

Naturopathy

There was a naturopathic doctor in the house. An "N.D." gets the same four year training as an M.D., and then some. And they have to pass with 70%, not the 60% for M.D.s.

The N.D. told us that there is a group of people who "do not want us well". Her answer as to why this was so is chilling. She said there are various powerful, elite groups who think there are too many 'unproductive' people in the world. They can afford to protect their health. But the bodies of the rest of us are becoming a cauldron of alien, interacting chemicals. The cancer rate is increasing, fertility is decreasing, birth defects are increasing, and organically induced brain disorders are increasing.

Toward this, drug companies have Health Canada in their pockets and doctors are getting direct kickbacks from them. So the drug companies are terrified that the truth will get out that drugs are not the way to health. They want to make it illegal to tell the truth. They are attacking small and medium sized companies that create useful and safe products.

Fortunately, the federal health minister is on the public's side. She is pushing for the 'black box' approach to labeling drugs, and is promoting bill C-420. This defines that all natural substances as food, and all artificial substances as drugs. This is very important because it protects our access to substances such as vitamin C, much more effective than any antibiotic, from the codex alimentarius.

The codex was developed in the European union in the 1960's to guarantee people's access to safe food and to medicinal substances. Over time it has been manipulated into the opposite of its original intent. In 2004 the administration of the codex was taken over by the world trade organization.

The films

We almost ran out of time to show the two films, which would have been a loss.

Drug companies are among the most profitable in the world. One reason they became so, is by "creating diseases"; pathologizing trivial problems. Drugs and the conditions they treat are "branded"; the "ill for every pill" syndrome. For example, five years ago no one had ever heard of 'social anxiety disorder'. Now it is a billion dollar market. We used to call it 'shyness'.

It is debatable whether these drugs help anybody, and whether becoming a psychiatric patient is more dangerous than being left untreated. One person who has been on these drugs says, "all the panic attacks you missed while (on the drug) , you get when you try to (go off it)."

Health costs are rising in Canada because drug costs are rising. It is now a bigger part of health care than doctor's fees.

Two recommended web sites.