The following is a transcript of this video.
In his book Toxic Psychiatry, the psychiatrist Peter Breggin issued the following warning:
“Do not abruptly stop most psychiatric drugs! Most psychiatric drugs are far more dangerous to take than people realize, but they also can become dangerous when discontinued too abruptly…most have addictive qualities and can produce withdrawal symptoms that are emotionally and physically distressing and sometimes life–threatening.”
Peter Breggin, Toxic Psychiatry
Since 1986, antidepressant use has tripled in the United States. The CDC reports that between 2017 and 2020, 13% of American adults were taking an antidepressant, as were 10% of middle-aged Europeans. In the UK, between 2022 and 2023, prescriptions for stimulants to treat ADHD rose 28% among adults, and 9.9% among children. The use of anti-anxiety drugs as well as antipsychotics has also been on the rise for several decades. Doctors, psychiatrists, and pharmaceutical companies tell the public that psychiatric drugs are safe and effective. In this video, we look at some of the research which shows that psychiatric drugs can worsen mental health conditions and intensify suffering, rather than providing relief.
Depression is the most common mental disorder, and antidepressants are the most commonly used psychiatric drug. Let us, therefore, begin by exploring the evidence which shows that antidepressants are harmful to mental health.
“Societal belief in the efficacy of antidepressants was born with the arrival of Prozac in 1988. [The pharmaceutical company] Eli Lilly, it seemed, had come up with a very good pill for the blues. This selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) was said to make people feel “better than well.” Unfortunately, once researchers began poking through the clinical trial data submitted to the FDA for Prozac and the other [antidepressants] that were subsequently brought to market, the “wonder drug” story fell apart.”
Robert Whitaker, Anatomy of an Epidemic
Irving Kirsch, a professor at Harvard Medical School, is one of the researchers responsible for dismantling the story of antidepressants sold to the public. In the mid 1990s, Kirsch was approached by a graduate student, Guy Sapirstein, who wanted to know to what extent antidepressants “work” because of their placebo effects. The placebo effect occurs when an individual takes a drug or undergoes a treatment which lacks healing properties, but because the patient believes otherwise, the power of belief helps effectuate a cure. Pharmaceutical companies are required to test their drugs against a placebo, such as a sugar pill, in order to prove that the ingredients of the drugs have positive benefits and that symptomatic improvements are not solely the result of the patient’s beliefs. In studies on antidepressants, for example, patients are separated into two groups. One group is given antidepressants, while the other is given a placebo. Neither group is told whether they are taking the placebo or the real drug. For an antidepressant to be considered effective, the patients taking an antidepressant must show greater improvement than the patients taking the placebo.
Kirsch and Sapirstein analyzed the data from a large number of antidepressant studies. To their surprise, they discovered that 40% of all studies on antidepressants were unpublished by pharmaceutical companies and thus unavailable to the public. Kirsch appealed to the Freedom of Information Act to obtain the data from these unpublished trials.
“What we expected to find,” explained Kirsch, “was that people who took the antidepressant would do far better than those taking the placebo, the sugar pill. We couldn’t have been more wrong.”
Irving Kirsch, Quoted in Cracked: Why Psychiatry is Doing More Harm Than Good
Regarding what Kirsch discovered, James Davies writes:
“…Kirsch’s meta-analysis (which included both published and unpublished trials)…concluded that the new wave of antidepressants heralded as wonder drugs…worked no better than dummy [or sugar] pills for the vast majority of patients. Of course, there were about 10 percent to 15 percent of people, the very extremely depressed, for whom these pills worked in a very minor way…but this meant, as Kirsch pointed out, that about “85 percent to 90 percent of people being prescribed antidepressants are not getting any clinically meaningful benefit from the drug itself.””
James Davies, Cracked: Why Psychiatry is Doing More Harm Than Good
These findings were replicated by Walter Brown, a professor of psychiatry at Brown University.
“We pretty much found the same thing as Kirsch. For a small minority of patients (the most severely depressed), our studies showed that antidepressants may have some minor benefits. But for mildly\moderately depressed patients, our results confirm that antidepressants offer no advantage over placebos, alternative therapies, or even moderate exercise.”
Walter Brown, Quoted in Cracked: Why Psychiatry is Doing More Harm Than Good
The minor benefits some severely depressed patients experience with antidepressants can be attributed to their mind numbing and emotional blunting effects. “We know [antidepressant] pills can have this sort of numbing effect, creating a kind of emotional disengagement,” (Joanna Moncrieff, The Myth of the Chemical Cure). Severe depression is accompanied by intense and chronic negative emotions, and so the numbing effects produced by antidepressants can be felt as a relief. A study conducted by researchers at Oxford University discovered that:
“Most [severely depressed patients who took antidepressants] described a general reduction in the intensity of all the emotions that they experienced, using words like “dulled,” “numbed,” “flattened,” or completely “blocked” to capture how they felt. A few participants described feeling no emotions at all…All [depressed patients] experienced a reduction of intensity or frequency of negative emotions. Most considered that at some stage the reduction in negative emotions was beneficial to them, bringing relief from distressing negative emotions like emotional distress, anger, irritability, aggression, anxiety, worry, or fear.”
Jonathan Price Et al., Emotional Side Effects of Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors
The initial relief offered by antidepressants, however, does not solve the underlying problems that give rise to depressive symptoms. Furthermore, the initial numbing effects are temporary and over time they fade and give way to a host of negative side effects.
“We can start with the physical problems. [Antidepressants] may cause insomnia, sexual dysfunction, headaches, gastrointestinal problems, dizziness, tremors, nervousness, muscle cramps, muscle weakness, seizures, and a severe inner agitation known as akathisia, which is associated with an increased risk of violence and suicide.”
Robert Whitaker, Anatomy of an Epidemic
Regarding the increased risk of violence and suicide, Joanna Moncrieff writes that “there is a strong and statistically significant correlation between increased rates of prescription of antidepressants and rising suicide rates.” (Joanna Moncrieff, The Myth of the Chemical Cure) In the 1990s, there were numerous anecdotes of individuals on Prozac who killed themselves or committed horrific crimes, and two lawsuits in particular grabbed the public’s attention.
