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February 15, 2008, marks the date of another situation where a black-clad student who had gone off of some type of medication walked into a lecture hall filled with students and began shooting with a shotgun and two handguns.  He killed 5 and wounded 18 before killing himself.  We was supposedly an outstanding graduate student whose behavior became erratic shortly before the murders.  Kazmierczak, the student, was on some type of medication, but had stopped taking it.

It is of interest that Cho Seung-Hui who committed the mass killing at Virginia Tech was also on medication which was not named at the time he committed his crime.  We now know he was taking the anti-depressant Paroxetine.

These episodes should serve as a warning that there are distinct risks for individuals and for society at large in the widespread use of these medications.  Pharmaceutical drugs are often used today to mask symptoms as an alternative to investigation of the causes of problems and addressing them on a nutritional and biochemical basis.

The following newsletter describes the bewitching effect some of these psychiatric medications can have.  We believe increased intake of quality fats such as salmon oil and concentrated grain oils, B complex vitamins, free-form amino acids, and chelated minerals would go a long way to remedy a good many of the mental instabilities we see in society today.  I hope you enjoy this highly significant paper.

Nutrition Nuggets: Bewitched

From the December 2007 GNLD Newsletter
by Jim McAfee

Millions of prescriptions for psychiatric drugs are filled in the United States every year.  This tells us that

1. many people do not feel well emotionally,
2. they think medications make them feel better, and
3. the medical profession sees psychiatric medications as the primary and
   easiest means of addressing emotional problems.

Peter Breggin, M.D., observes that a huge percentage of the American population uses one of three classes of drugs which have an effect upon mental functioning.

These are:

1. Legal recreational drugs such as caffeine, nicotine, and alcohol.
2. Illegal drugs such as marijuana, methamphetamine, cocaine, and heroin.
3. And prescription psychiatric drugs including stimulants and antidepressants.

Breggin suggests that all psychoactive drugs tend to have addictive properties.  A major component of these addictive properties is the causation of significant withdrawal problems which develop when someone makes an effort to stop them.  Breggin is most concerned about the modern antidepressants.  He points out that these medications can trigger criminal behavior in people with no prior history of criminal behavior.

Breggin maintains that there is a "spellbinding" effect of psychiatric medications.  Individuals whose behavior is altered by psychiatric medications "fail to perceive that they are acting in an irrational, uncharacteristic, and dangerous manner."  Elsewhere he writes, "victims of drug-induced abnormal mental states and behavior almost never seem to have an inkling that they are acting irrationally."

This remarkable failure is because the "therapeutic" effect is achieved by "impairing higher human functions including emotional responsiveness, social sensitivity, self-awareness or self-insight, autonomy, and self-determination".  The effect is similar to an individual who is slightly intoxicated with alcohol that thinks he has become a social butterfly and that he is not impaired enough to drive.

The failure to perceive the harmful effects of psychiatric medications tends to lead to an overestimation of the beneficial effects of the drug usage.  Psychiatric drugs increase compliance with obsessive tasks.  They make adults and children more compliant.  As higher brain functions shut down they become more apathetic toward themselves and less anxious.  Patients usually think the medication is helping and continue to take it though they sometimes continue to deteriorate mentally.  In extreme cases, violence against themselves and others results.

The irony of this situation is that both patients and professionals often think an individual is improving when his mental functioning is deteriorating.  Only when a violent episode or other abnormal behavior takes place does it become clear that something is wrong, but rarely is this abnormal behavior associated with the medications.  Rather the abnormal behavior is associated with the condition which led to the use of the medication in the first place.

Orthomolecular medicine would seek to find the biochemical defect causing the initial problem and treat it with natural compounds rather than unnatural pharmaceuticals.  It is interesting that Breggin chose the term "spellbinding" to describe the effect of these unnatural medications.  The word "pharmaceia" means sorcery or witchcraft.  It referred to the seductions and deceptions of the craft of the sorcerer.

REFERENCES:   Breggin, Peter R., Intoxication anosognosia: The spellbinding effect of psychiatric drugs, Ethical Human Psychology and Psychiatry, Volume 8, Number 3, Fall/Winter 2006, 201-216.