{"id":702,"date":"2013-02-09T18:15:26","date_gmt":"2013-02-10T00:15:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/?p=702"},"modified":"2024-07-14T05:41:45","modified_gmt":"2024-07-14T10:41:45","slug":"the-militarys-billion-dollar-pill-problem","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/2013\/02\/09\/the-militarys-billion-dollar-pill-problem\/","title":{"rendered":"The Military’s Billion-Dollar Pill Problem"},"content":{"rendered":"

A recent article in Men’s Journal<\/em> magazine<\/a> by Paul John Scott presents a vivid human interest story about the damage that psychiatric drugs are doing in the U.S. Military.<\/p>\n

\n
“At a time when soldiers kill themselves in record numbers \u00e2\u20ac\u201c 18 veterans per day \u00e2\u20ac\u201c the armed forces spend a fortune on a drug known to increase the chance of suicide.”<\/dd>\n<\/dl>\n

The article goes on to say \u00e2\u20ac\u201d<\/p>\n

\n
“American soldiers (active soldiers as well as retired) have never been more medicated than they are now: In 2010, more than 213,000 service members (roughly 20 percent of active-duty military) were taking medications the military considered “high risk” \u00e2\u20ac\u201c from epilepsy drugs to psychiatric pills like Seroquel. But what’s more incredible is that Seroquel and other antipsychotics are expensive (as much as $10 a dose) and not proven to be effective in treating the very conditions for which the military and VA most often prescribe them: insomnia and PTSD. But that didn’t prevent their use by the military from increasing tenfold between 2002 and 2009.”<\/dd>\n<\/dl>\n

and<\/p>\n

\n
“…80 percent of soldiers with PTSD are given psychotropic drugs, many of which can raise the risk of suicide.”<\/dd>\n<\/dl>\n

and<\/p>\n

\n
“While the military is doling out all kinds of psychiatric drugs, none is more troubling than the atypical antipsychotics \u00e2\u20ac\u201c blockbuster drugs with names like Seroquel, Risperdal, Zyprexa, Geodon, and Abilify. According to 2010 Department of Defense records, about 11,000 active-duty troops were on Seroquel. Since 2001, the VA has spent more than $1.5 billion and the Department of Defense more than $88 million on two atypicals alone, Seroquel and Risperdal.”<\/dd>\n<\/dl>\n

Please thank the article’s author by leaving him a message here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Read more about drugging in the military here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

You can have a voice in this waste and abuse. Here are places you can express your outrage:<\/p>\n

Secretary of Defense
\n1000 Defense Pentagon
\nWashington, DC 20301-1000
\ndpcintrn@osd.pentagon.mil<\/a><\/p>\n

Department of Defense
\nOffice of Inspector General
\n4800 Mark Center Drive
\nAlexandria, VA 22350-1500
\nhotline@dodig.mil<\/a><\/p>\n

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
\n9999 Joint Staff Pentagon
\nWashington, DC 20318-9999
\njointstaffig@js.pentagon.mil<\/a><\/p>\n

Secretary of the Army
\n101 Army Pentagon
\nWashington, DC 20310-0101
\nusarmy.pentagon.hqda-oaa.mbx.oaa-communications-poc@mail.mil<\/a><\/p>\n

Secretary of the Navy
\n1000 Navy Pentagon
\nWashington, DC 20350-1000
\nray.mabus@navy.mil<\/a><\/p>\n

Secretary of the Air Force
\n1670 Air Force Pentagon
\nWashington, DC 20330-1670
\nhttp:\/\/www.af.mil\/main\/contactus.asp<\/a><\/p>\n

Commandant of the Marine Corps
\nHeadquarters USMC
\n2 Navy Annex (CMC)
\nWashington, DC 20380-1775
\nmarine.mail.fct@usmc.mil<\/a><\/p>\n

Department of Veterans Affairs
\nVA Inspector General Hotline (53E)
\nP.O. BOX 50410
\nWASHINGTON, DC 20091-0410
\nvaoighotline@va.gov<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A recent article in Men’s Journal magazine by Paul John Scott presents a vivid human interest story about the damage that psychiatric drugs are doing in the U.S. Military. “At a time when soldiers kill themselves in record numbers \u00e2\u20ac\u201c … 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":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2,3],"tags":[79,77,20,21],"class_list":["post-702","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-big-muddy-river-newsletter","category-press-releases","tag-military","tag-psychiatric-drugs","tag-ptsd","tag-suicide"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6NMpC-bk","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/702","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=702"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/702\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=702"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=702"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=702"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}