I greatly admire Dr. Michael Corry's courage to challenge bio-psychiatry. I think he is a brave man for naming the truth and standing by his comments. Bio-psychiatry is autocratic by nature and peddling pharmacology rather than promoting true recovery. This is evident in the system's defensive response to Dr. Corry's comments.

Dr Michael Corry is one of the few doctors in Ireland who is prepared to speak the truth and is not prepared to be bribed by the pharmaceutical companies. He does this at tremendous personal cost.

Psychiatric survivors worldwide know too well how psychotropic drugs can distort mental, emotional and physical capacity. We have had our lives turned upside down by toxic drugs. Some of us have had to endure a living death and others have chosen suicide because the tortuous pain was too difficult.

We feel some comfort that a least someone is prepared to stand up and be counted. Thank you Dr Michael Corry.

At last a Psychiatrist who seems to be concerned for his own profession. The nature of these drugs has been under question for many decades. It is unacceptable that families offered "care" and "help" are put through these nightmares to the extent that no one can hardly remember what the original problem was. Time for change.

Thank God....a doctor who is not in the hip pockets of the pharmaceutical or insurance industries. These "legalized" drug pushers continue to threaten and intimidate anyone who questions them and I believe, this doctor should be applauded for his courage, not persecuted.

This quote, to me, sums up the toxic field of psychiatry - "Given the choice between changing one’s mind and proving that there is no need to do so, almost everyone gets busy on the proof" - John Kenneth Galbraith

Michael Corry like others before him is simply asserting the truth that many of us know. This of course requires that not only do the bigots, bullies and misguided self appointed "experts" in psychiatry change their minds, but learn the art of humility, caring and compassion. Money, power and greed - and the maintenance of distressed people- has been the dictate of psychiatry for too long. It is time for the winds of change and more courageous people to come forward, like Michael and assert the truth.

For the great majority of us enjoying its delusional fruits, our controlling conditioned reality is `your only man' presided over by an emperor who in latter years only now and then appears without any clothes.
Psychiatrists, the most powerful and highly rewarded of its defenders, are licensed to cloth this imposter, to defend those delusions by stigma (with psychiatric labels)
intoxication (with narcotics), even to damage the brain(with ECT).
We should thank our lucky stars that
Dr.Corry is among the paltry few who continues to break ranks, who understands this equation and is among the fewer still who have the courage to say and do something about it.

This review is from: The Myth of the Chemical Cure: A Critique of Psychiatric Drug Treatment. I wrote it in February 2008, it appears on the Amazon website, under the book of this name.

A more enlightened view of what psychiatry should be is given on my website, www.DrBobJohnson.org/mind.html

THE PSYCHIATRIC TRUTH THAT DARES NOT SPEAK ITS NAME.

Student massacres in the US since Columbine, are invariably heart-wrenching - last month there were four such multiple killings in a single week - what's happening and where will it end? There is one obvious explanation - but so far, it's proved too hot to handle. Perhaps now that Prozac and other psychiatric drugs are unravelling, an even harsher medical truth can emerge.

First let's get a grip on what goes on. Suppose all these student killers were drunk - that would make immediate sense. Alcohol is well known to confuse the mind, stifle normal rules of behaviour and thereby unleash violence. This would explain it all - acting, violently, while not in full control of their faculties - this is entirely characteristic of intoxication - and it closely resembles what all the perpetrators did. And the connection is closer than you think.

Alcohol itself does not feature in these massacres - but Dr Joanna MonCrieff's book makes the link painfully obvious, concluding (p224). ". . . exposing our miracle cures as psychoactive chemicals, which distort normal brain function by producing a state of intoxication." [my emphasis]. This is a tightly argued book providing irrefutable evidence that no psychiatric drug is superior to alcohol. Worse - whatever effects they produce arise through varying degrees of confusion or sedation - the ominously termed drug-induced `frontal lobe syndrome'. This is the awful psychiatric truth that dares not speak its name.

The myth she so punctiliously punctures has a long history of obfuscation. Fifty-five years ago the `Nine Hospital Study', which started the whole thing off, did not prove that the new `tranquilisers' cured schizophrenia. What they showed was that after 6 weeks there were fewer symptoms - the sedative effect, but that after 12 months the drugged patients were worse - the zombie effect. Psychiatrists and legislators have shamefully ignored this ever since.

Dr MonCrieff leaves no wriggle room for purblind psychiatrists or legislators. In my 45 years as a psychiatrist, I've never seen a clearer condemnation of today's psychiatry. The book's target audience is academic, and sadly its tone and price reflect this - but the last chapter says it all, and should be compulsory reading for every psychiatrist, every politician and every consumer of these increasingly potent drugs. Dangerous mandatory and toxic medical practices will otherwise continue unabated - until others match Dr MonCrieff's courage, and publicise this devastating message.

Dr Bob Johnson Wednesday, 27 February 2008

Consultant Psychiatrist, MRCPscyh, MRCGP, PhD

It is well established that the anti-depressants are responsible for homicides and suicides.

People do not understand: why they have done these things after they have done it.

Because they have no idea why they are doing it, when they are on these mind - bending drugs.

People jump in the river, cut themselves, kill another person.
The drug companies do know this, but they cover-up for the sake of money.

Now is the time for good men and women to stand up. Dr. Michael Corry has put his job on the line for years with his courageous stand against what passes for treatments in the area of mental health. He is the chink in the armour of the Pharma/Psych alliance, but unless other professionals step forward and support him the vested interests will silence him. It is time to tell the truth.

I myself was prescribed the SSRI Seroxat and like Shane Clancy , I had a complete change of personality and behavior, I went from depressed before meds to suicidal, aggressive and impulsive. Michael Corry is an absolute gent and he has always had the best interests of his patients (and those whom suffer mental illness) at heart. Many of his colleagues in the (pharmaceutical funded) psychiatric profession on the other hand, do not. He is one brave man to so stand up and go against such dark forces. I wish him well. He is the only one brave enough to speak out about the real dangers of these drugs.. information that, until now, the psychiatric profession has tried to withold and suppress. Mr Corry, I salute you! :)

Dear Sir - i am a little disappointed at the content of this discussion which does little to address the difficult reality of treating and caring for patients with mental illness. Much of the above comments are based on the 17th century Cartesian argument of the "mind/body" split or idea that emotional distress and mental illness do not have any biological basis. It is equally inaccurate, of course, to assert that environmental influences and life events do not play a pivotal role in precipitating or perpetuating mental illness in vulnerable individuals. Modern neuroscience and psychiatric practice recognises that both environmental influences and inherited or developmental biological vulnerabilities are relevant to the development of mental illness in many cases. It is not surprising therefore that sucessful interventional strategies should draw upon a range of both biological and psychosocial treatment modalities tailored to the individual needs of each patient. The polarisation of this argument into "biological" versus "psychosocial" is both inaccurate and unhelpful for patients. The configuration of psychiatric services in Ireland has moved towards a multidisciplinary approach whereby medical professionals work within a team of allied health professionals (psychologists, nurses, social workers etc) towards a holistic solution for each patient. This practice model (which is the ideal) is all too frequently sabotaged by the harsh reality of providing some system of care in the absence of adequate resources. The real tragedy here is that mental health services in Ireland, and youth mental health services in particular, are woefully inadequate and underfunded. This is unlikely to change when vested interests on one side of the therapeutic divide engage in professional denigration and point scoring. Is it time for "anti-psychiatry" to move in from the margins and invest their energies in a more "pro-patient" approach ?

Beg to differ wrote:
"...Is it time for "anti-psychiatry" to move in from the margins and invest their energies in a more "pro-patient" approach ?"

That would require that a person who might be characterised as "anti-psychiatry" were invited to contribute. As it happens, several of my blogging colleagues, who have been dubbed "anti-psychiatry," have arrived at their positions owing to their passionate determination to assist either themselves or others.

We have awkward questions to ask of psychiatrists. Joseph Biederman still hasn't explained to me why he deserves to call himself an expert, when he's never fixed anybody. That may sound provocative, but I was being deadly serious.

These people have no credibility in the eyes of those who have been on the wrong end of their desperate need to find illness. None.