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Federal government launches marketing campaign for psychiatric industry

Online Journal | November 29, 2006
Richard A. Warner

Under the guise of combating the stigma of mental illness, the U.S. government will soon begin a massive campaign of psychiatric indoctrination, designed to increase the acceptance of psychiatric chemical imbalance theories and labeling, and to pave the way for national psychiatric screening, driving more Americans into seeking psychiatric drug treatment.

Regional meetings in support of the National Anti-Stigma Campaign (NASC), a nationwide television, radio and print public service advertising program funded by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), were held this past summer in Los Angeles, Denver, Chicago and Washington, D.C. According to a senior technical assistance specialist at the SAMHSA Resource Center to Address Discrimination and Stigma Associated with Mental Illness (ADS Center), the ad campaign, which will target 18-25-year olds, will be launched today. A campaign directed at older adults and ethnic and racial minorities will follow.

On its surface, the campaign's message may seem perfectly appropriate, even compassionate. Its stated objective is to ?encourage, educate and inspire 18-25-year olds to step up and support friends they know are experiencing a mental health problem.? One ad, for example, shows a man with his hand over his eyes. ?Sometimes I find myself turning away from or just ignoring someone with a mental illness, avoiding eye contact,? he says. ?I know it is not their fault but sometimes I don't know how to communicate with them.?

But there can be no doubt about the real purpose of the campaign's emotional appeal: to create customers for the psychiatric/pharmaceutical industry. This is clearly evident at SAMHSA's website and in its literature. It is no accident that 18-25-year olds were chosen as the first target. A SAMHSA ?Fact Sheet? states, ?Among 18-25-year olds, the prevalence of serious mental health conditions is high . . . yet this age group shows the lowest rate of help-seeking behaviors [emphasis added].? ?Help-seeking behavior? is, of course, a euphemism for being psychiatrically diagnosed and drugged. The 18-25-year old demographic represents a huge untapped market for psychiatric drugs and services. According to SAMHSA's website, the anti-stigma media blitz ?has been designed to establish a ?new norm,' in which individuals, without hesitation, will seek out the mental health services they need and deserve.?

The drug industry seeds NASC

Further evidence of SAMHSA's marketing agenda is found in the origins of the National Anti-Stigma Campaign. The program was first recommended by a federal commission that had extensive ties to the pharmaceutical industry. In its 2003 report, Achieving the Promise: Transforming Mental Health Care in America, the President's New Freedom Commission (NFC) on Mental Health called for the government to ?undertake a national campaign to reduce stigma.? The NFC proposed ?national education initiatives? to ?shatter the misconceptions about mental illnesses, thus helping more Americans understand the facts and making them more willing to seek help for mental health problems? and advocated ?actions of reducing stigma, increasing awareness, and encouraging treatment . . . (emphasis added).?

Several members of the NFC had extensive ties to the pharmaceutical industry, principally by way of an industry marketing scheme that was developed in Texas in the 1990s. Known as the Texas Medication Algorithm Project, or TMAP, it was designed to make the newest and most expensive psychiatric drugs the first (and virtually only) treatment option for mental health care. The project was nurtured at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas, a major research center that conducts drug trials for pharmaceutical companies, with significant funding coming from the drug companies themselves. Pharmaceutical company gifts to the Texas Department of State Health Services totaled $1.3 million from 1997 to 2004, with at least $834,000 earmarked for TMAP.

Backed by drug industry funding, TMAP was then exported to other states via the National Association of State Mental Health Program Directors (NASMHPD).

The chair of the NFC, Michael Hogan, was the Mental Health Program Director in Ohio when the Ohio Medication Algorithm Project (OMAP), was adopted there. A 2004 Janssen (makers of the atypical antispsychotic, Risperdal) publication, ?Mental Health Issues Today,? lists Hogan as a member of their Advisory Board. In 2005, Eli Lilly (makers of the atypical antipsychotic, Zyprexa and the antidepressant, Prozac) gave Hogan its Lifetime Achievement Award. Hogan was president of the NASMHPD from 2003-2004 and president of the NASMHPD Research Institute, which is heavily funded by the pharmaceutical industry, from 1989-2000.

Another NFC member, Stephen Mayberg, was the California State Mental Health Program Director when TMAP was adopted in that state. Mayberg is also a past president of NASMHPD and the NASMHPD Research Institute.

NFC member Charles Curie, who recently stepped down as the administrator of SAMHSA, was the Deputy Secretary for Mental Health and Substance Abuse Services in Pennsylvania when PENNMAP was enacted. According Allen Jones, an investigator in the Pennsylvania Office of Inspector General and a whistleblower, Curie is reported to have set up a slush fund from which state employees could solicit grants from the pharmaceutical industry.

NFC member psychiatrist Rodolfo Arredondo served on the board of the Texas Department of Mental Health and Mental Retardation during TMAP's development, while another NFC commissioner, Robert Postlethwait, has had a long career with Eli Lilly and Company.

According to Jones, at least 14 of the 22 NFC members have drug industry ties. Not surprisingly, the NFC selected TMAP as a model program and stated that the ?biggest challenge? was to ensure that TMAP was ?implemented in other states and localities.?

The psychiatric industry is well on its way to meeting that challenge -- with disastrous results for our youth. A similar pattern emerges in states which have adopted TMAP. In Texas, 19,404 teenagers were prescribed an antipsychotic in July or August of 2004. Ninety-eight percent received the newer atypical antipsychotics. In April of 2004, the Texas Comptroller, Carole Strayhorn, released a report, Forgotten Children, that was highly critical of the psychiatric drugging of foster children in Texas.

In 2005, the Columbus (Ohio) Dispatch ran a two-part story, ?Drugged Into Submission,? on the psychiatric drugging of children, including 700 babies and toddlers, under state care. Part one was titled, ?Forced Medication Straitjackets Kids.?

In 1998, the Los Angeles Times reported, ?Children under state protection in California group and foster homes are being drugged with potent, dangerous psychiatric medications, at times just to keep them obedient and docile for their overburdened caretakers.?

In Pennsylvania, Dr. Stephan Kruszewski, a Harvard trained psychiatrist working for the Pennsylvania's Department of Public Welfare, complained that children were being heavily drugged with antipsychotics and anticonvulsants (mainly Neurontin). He was fired.

In Washington State, atypical antipsychotics ranked 1, 3, and 5 on the Medical Assistance Administration's list of top 100 drugs by money paid in 2004, with nearly $78 million spent on those three drugs: Zyprexa ($36 million), Risperdal ($21 million), Seroquel ($20.8 million). Neurontin was #4, at $20.8 million. Antidepressants Zoloft, Effexor and Paxil came in at #7, #11 and #12, with nearly $31 million spent on those three drugs. A 1997 Seattle Post-Intelligencer series charged that an ?unmonitored stream of mood drugs imperils children entrusted to state.?

Additional confirmation of the drug industry's control of SAMHSA comes in the form of an email sent to me by the previously mentioned senior technical assistance specialist at SAMHSA. The email was a response to my inquiry about the anti-stigma campaign. The assistance specialist sent a copy of her response and my original inquiry, to the NASC liaison at NAMI. NAMI, of course, is the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill, a well-known front group for the pharmaceutical industry. SAMHSA is obviously working hand in hand with NAMI -- even forwarding private communication from the public to NAMI's offices. In 1999, Mother Jones magazine reported that 18 drug firms gave NAMI a total of $11.72 million between 1996 and 1999. NAMI continually promotes psychiatric chemical imbalance theories, minimizes the damaging effects of psychiatric drugs, and advocates for forced psychiatric drugging programs.

On May 28, 2006, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported that NAMI ?did not disclose that Lilly [Eli Lilly, makers of Zyprexa and Prozac] marketing manager Gerald Radke briefly ran its entire operation. Radke began in 1999 as a Lilly-paid ?management consultant,' then left Lilly and served as NAMI's paid ?interim executive director' until mid-2001. The group acknowledged this only after being shown Radke's resume listing the job.?

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