{"id":3173,"date":"2024-05-27T10:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-05-27T15:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/?p=3173"},"modified":"2024-07-14T05:38:08","modified_gmt":"2024-07-14T10:38:08","slug":"psychiatrists-refusal-to-align-with-un-who-on-ending-forced-psychiatric-treatment-is-big-reason-us-lags-on-mental-health-human-rights","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/2024\/05\/27\/psychiatrists-refusal-to-align-with-un-who-on-ending-forced-psychiatric-treatment-is-big-reason-us-lags-on-mental-health-human-rights\/","title":{"rendered":"Psychiatrists\u2019 Refusal to Align with UN, WHO on Ending Forced Psychiatric Treatment is Big Reason US Lags on Mental Health Human Rights"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Citizens Commission on Human Rights marches in protest, opens human rights exhibit, delivers open letter to American Psychiatric Association leadership demanding it adopt international human rights standards to end coercive psychiatric practices.<\/em><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

by\u00a0CCHR National Affairs Office<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Citizens Commission on Human Rights (CCHR), a mental health industry watchdog, launched\u00a0a series of actions<\/a>\u00a0to draw attention to the American Psychiatric Association\u2019s (APA) refusal to reverse its support of forced psychiatric treatment, remaining instead at odds with international human rights standards and leaving the US lagging the global movement to restore human rights in the field of mental health.\u00a0 Coercive psychiatric practices include involuntary institutionalization, forced drugging, mechanical and chemical restraints, seclusion, and nonconsensual electroconvulsive therapy (ECT, or electroshock).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a protest march organized by CCHR, demonstrators marched through Times Square to the Javits Center in New York City on May 4, site of the APA\u2019s annual conference, drawing the attention of conference attendees with chanting and signs demanding an end to forced psychiatric treatment, a ban on ECT, and an end to the rampant psychiatric drugging of children.\u00a0 As a follow-on to the APA\u2019s 2021\u00a0admission<\/a>\u00a0that systemic racism is ingrained in psychiatric practices, signs also demanded an end to those racist practices.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Overhead, an airplane banner called for the banning of ECT, while a Jumbotron truck driving in the area broadcast CCHR\u2019s documentary,\u00a0Therapy or Torture: The Truth About Electroshock<\/em><\/a>.<\/u><\/p>\n\n\n\n

CCHR also hand-delivered an\u00a0open letter<\/a>\u00a0to the leadership of the APA, Petros Levounis, President, and Saul M. Levin, Chief Executive Officer, at their conference, calling on the organization to renounce involuntary mental health treatment.\u00a0 Copies of the letter were sent to the heads of the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) and the U.S.-based office of the World Health Organization (WHO).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2023, WHO and OHCHR\u00a0called<\/a>\u00a0for an end to all forced mental health treatment, saying coercive practices \u201cviolate the right to be protected from torture or cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment.\u201d\u00a0 WHO\/OHCHR also advised, \u201cInternational human rights standards clarify that ECT without consent violates the right to physical and mental integrity and may constitute torture and ill-treatment,\u201d and called for banning ECT for children.\u00a0 ECT passes electricity through the brain to cause convulsions, with the risk of brain damage and permanent memory loss.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The CCHR letter also referenced 2021\u00a0guidance<\/a>\u00a0from WHO that coercive mental health treatment should end even for those experiencing acute mental distress, pointing out that individuals in mental health crisis \u201care at a heightened risk of their human rights being violated, including through forced admissions and treatment\u2026.These practices have been shown to be harmful to people\u2019s mental, emotional and physical health, sometimes leading to death.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Among international psychiatric organizations, the World Psychiatric Association has stated its concern about \u201cthe extent to which coercive interventions violate\u201d human rights, and the European Congress of Psychiatry has held a special session aimed at reducing the use of coercive measures. \u00a0Julian Beezhold, MD, current chair of the European Psychiatric Association\u2019s Section on Emergency Psychiatry, is also\u00a0on record<\/a>\u00a0saying that examining how to reduce coercive practices in psychiatry is a priority for his association.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In contrast, the APA has maintained its support of the profitable practices, which have left maimed and traumatized patients in their wake.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe demand the APA renounce coercive practices that damage and traumatize patients and, in the case of ECT, cause brain damage, memory loss and even death in the name of mental health treatment,\u201d said Anne Goedeke, president of the CCHR National Affairs Office in Washington, DC. \u201cPsychiatrists should not be exposing their patients to these unconscionable risks.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Watch now: Video from CCHR\u2019s NYC protest and exhibit<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

New Yorkers were invited to tour CCHR\u2019s \u201cPsychiatry: An Industry of Death<\/em>\u201d exhibit, which ran through May 12 at Union Square in New York City.\u00a0 The free exhibit, which has toured the world, exposes some little-known history of psychiatry and how psychiatric practices have harmed patients.\u00a0 Facts presented in the exhibit\u2019s panels reveal the staggering number of children prescribed psychiatric drugs, psychiatry\u2019s sordid history of brain-damaging psychosurgery and electroshock, and the prime role of psychiatrists in instigating and perpetuating racism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rev. Fred Shaw, CCHR International spokesperson and founder of the CCHR Task Force Against Racism and Modern-Day Eugenics, gave the keynote address at the exhibit grand opening May 5, followed by remarks by New York human rights activists Marion \u201cTiny\u201d Frampton, a former gang member in The Black Spades (TBS) and now Harlem community activist and founder of TBS New Directions; former Harlem Globetrotter, now international goodwill ambassador Bobby \u201cZorro\u201d Hunter; and Maliki Stone, human rights advocate and retired detective with the New York Police Department.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Citizens Commission on Human Rights marches in protest, opens human rights exhibit, delivers open letter to American Psychiatric Association leadership demanding it adopt international human rights standards to end coercive psychiatric practices. Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2,3],"tags":[209,154,93,58,217,113,148,207],"class_list":["post-3173","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-big-muddy-river-newsletter","category-press-releases","tag-apa","tag-coercive-psychiatry","tag-ect","tag-human-rights","tag-new-york","tag-racism","tag-united-nations","tag-who"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6NMpC-Pb","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3173","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3173"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3173\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3173"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3173"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3173"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}