Pharmaceutical Industry and Psychiatry – Conjoined Twins Joined at the Wallet

(OpEdNews) – “Unlimited spending! Schedule all the programs you can.” That was the management directive announced at the regional business meeting I attended when I first became a pharmaceutical rep. When I heard the announcement I felt like I was on an Enron train that was roaring down the tracks, and the company expected everyone to be on board. The company was giving its sales force unlimited funds to hire physicians as paid speakers, sometimes to influence other physicians to prescribe the company’s drugs, at other times to simply financially reward physicians who wrote high volumes of prescriptions every month for the company’s drugs.

Former Merck regional sales manager, Gene Carbona, told the New York Times that the only thing the company considered when selecting physicians to provide presentations was “the volume or potential volume of prescribing that the doctor could do.” This is true of all pharmaceutical companies. According to The Wall Street Journal (August 31, 2009), Eli Lilly alone paid physicians $22 million dollars in just the first quarter of 2009.

The higher a physician is on the influential ladder, the greater the financial rewards to be reaped. Pharmaceutical companies pay influential leaders who can sway public opinion and influence research. And the area of medicine receiving the greatest amount of pharmaceutical money is psychiatry. The American Psychiatric Association (APA) is the most drug industry financially supported medical association. In July 2008, Senator Charles Grassley’s demands that the APA provide an accounting of its finances revealed that in 2006 the pharmaceutical industry accounted for about 30 percent of the APA’s financing; more than $20 million dollars. Read More Here

MSM: Lives destroyed by happy pills: As our use of antidepressants DOUBLES in a decade, experts say thousands are being given dangerous drugs they don’t need

(DailyMail) – Increasing numbers of Britons are taking antidepressant drugs, with prescriptions doubling over the past ten years, according to a report this month. In 2000, there were 20 million prescriptions – this rose to 39 million last year.

While this rise is partly being blamed on the recession, experts are concerned that misdiagnosis is a major factor. Indeed, a study published recently in The Lancet found that the average GP will wrongly diagnose 16 out of every 100 patients they see with depression and anxiety. Read More Here

See Also:

(Rense) – Medically-Caused Deaths In America – An Exclusive Interview With Barbara Starfield

The American health system, like clockwork, causes a mind-boggling number of deaths every year.

The figures have been known for a decade. The story was covered briefly when a landmark study surfaced, and then it sank like a stone.

The truth was inconvenient for many interests. That has not changed. “Medical coverage for all” is a banner that conceals ugly facts. Read More Here

Dead doctors still making millions from Medicare billing

(NaturalNews) – Medicare issued as much as $92 million in payments between 2000 and 2007 for medical procedures or devices ordered under the names of doctors who had already died, according to a 2008 Senate committee report.

Prescriptions written in the names of deceased doctors are only one of the fraudulent techniques that plague the U.S. health care system, which has become a favorite target for organized crime.
“There are so many schemes involved,” said John Gillies, a special agent for the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). “Take any aspect of the healthcare industry and there’s a fraud going on in there right now.”

US Kids Represent Psychiatric Drug Goldmine

(Truthout) – Prescriptions for psychiatric drugs increased 50 percent with children in the US, and 73 percent among adults, from 1996 to 2006, according to a study in the May/June 2009 issue of the journal Health Affairs. Another study in the same issue of Health Affairs found spending for mental health care grew more than 30 percent over the same ten-year period, with almost all of the increase due to psychiatric drug costs.

“Food Standards Guidelines” Threaten Human Health

Codex Alimentarius (CA) serves corporate interests

MSM: Antidepressant use doubles in US, study finds

(Reuters) – Use of antidepressant drugs in the United States doubled between 1996 and 2005, probably because of a mix of factors, researchers reported on Monday.

MSM: Royal Pharmaceutical Society – Britain becoming nation of pill-takers

(Times) – The British are becoming increasingly reliant on medication, figures show today, with the number of prescriptions to combat allergies, diabetes and obesity all increasing last year.

Big Pharma Bribes Doctors to Hook Your Kids on Drugs

(AlterNet) – Americans must start to question the legitimacy of the exploitative pharmaceutical-industrial complex and the predatory people atop them.

MSM: The drugs don’t work

(Guardian) – The number of people on antidepressants is soaring – we may be more miserable, but let’s swap the pills for support and care

MSM: Antidepressant use soars as the recession bites

(Guardian) – Fears the recession is affecting the mental health of the nation appear to be borne out by new figures that show prescriptions of antidepressants are soaring.