Current media abounds about the opioid addiction and overdose crisis, and often points to the Sackler brothers of Purdue Pharma as major enablers of this horrific epidemic.
Rarely, however, does the media point out that Arthur, Mortimer and Raymond Sackler, pushing OxyContin for profit, were each practicing psychiatrists.
Psychiatrists have a history of pushing addictive drugs as “treatments.” LSD, heroin, psilocybin, mescaline, peyote, cannabis, ecstacy, and other hallucinogens have all been pushed by various psychiatrists as treatments for mental symptoms. Today, drug regulatory agencies all over the world approve clinical trials for the use of hallucinogenic drugs to handle anything from anxiety to alcoholism, despite the drugs being known to cause psychosis.
Now that psychiatrists have been exposed as perpetrators of drug addiction, we find that the opioid crisis has been claimed by the psychiatric industry as a behavioral health problem, because psychiatry claims that addiction is now a mental illness. Unfortunately there is no science to support this.
The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) and the International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems (ICD-10) euphemistically call addiction a “use disorder.” To cement its control of addiction “treatments”, the DSM lists hundreds of “use disorders” for a wide range of substances (alcohol, amphetamines, caffeine, cannabis, cocaine, inhalants, opioids, hallucinogens, phencyclidines, sedatives, hypnotics, anxiolytics, stimulants, tobacco, and other, unknown, or unspecified substances or stimulants.) Not to mention other types of impulsive or compulsive behaviors such as anorexia, gambling, gaming, pyromania, kleptomania and promiscuity.
Then, to confuse the situation even more, psychiatrists recommend treating drug addictions with more addictive drugs; this is called “medication-assisted treatment,” an increasingly influential and controversial paradigm in the world of medicine that, among other things, considers addiction a chronic “brain disease” treated by more drugs, rather than a condition that can be treated by addressing the social and spiritual aspects underlying addiction.
The late Professor Thomas Szasz said, “If we recognize that ‘mental illness’ is a metaphor for disapproved thoughts, feelings, and behaviors, we are compelled to recognize as well that the primary function of Psychiatry is to control thought, mood, and behavior.” Coercive psychiatry is not about curing mental disorders; it’s about controlling behavior and “we know best what’s good for you.”
By the way, you can also become addicted to common psychiatric drugs such as antidepressants, psychostimulants, anti-anxiety drugs, and barbiturates. Addictive drugs should never be discontinued abruptly, since the withdrawal side effects can be severe. For more information about how to safely withdraw from these harmful and addictive drugs, download and read the booklet Coming Off Psych Drugs Harm Reduction Guide.