"They should've kept testing the drug while it was making all that money - testing its effects on different groups," he says, "trying to improve its safety."
"However," he states, "they left out the group that deserves the highest level of protection - pregnant mothers and their unborn children."
According to Ms Curry, the belief that depression is actually a "deficiency" disease, akin to diabetes, has been so aggressively promoted that there is frequently an "uncritical acceptance" of the value of prescribing SSRIs, even for children.
"There is no scientific evidence that there is a serotonin "imbalance" in people who are depressed," she says, "that they have a serotonin dysfunction or that they need serotonin drugs to operate normally."
"In the early 21st century," she points out, "we still know very little about the complexities of brain function."
"There are trillions of synapses in the brain and hundreds of brain chemicals," she notes. "Little is known about how these chemicals inter-relate or act on neurons."
In "Serotonin and Depression: A Disconnect between the Advertisements and the Scientific Literature," published in the November 2005, Public Library of Science Journal, Jeffrey Lacasse, of the Florida State University College of Social Work, and Jonathan Leo, of the Lake Erie College of Osteopathic Medicine, state: "To our knowledge, there is not a single peer-reviewed article that can be accurately cited to directly support claims of serotonin deficiency in any mental disorder, while there are many articles that present counterevidence."
"Furthermore," the authors note, "the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), which is published by the American Psychiatric Association and contains the definitions of all psychiatric diagnoses, does not list serotonin as a cause of any mental disorder."
According to the article, the American Psychiatric Press Textbook of Clinical Psychiatry addresses serotonin deficiency as an unconfirmed hypothesis, stating, "Additional experience has not confirmed the monoamine depletion hypothesis"
"In short," the PLoS article states, "there exists no rigorous corroboration of the serotonin theory, and a significant body of contradictory evidence."
For thirty years, Harvard trained psychiatrist, Dr. Peter Breggin has served as an expert in civil and criminal actions against the manufacturers of psychiatric drugs. His work has provided the scientific basis for the original combined Prozac litigation and label changes on many psychiatric drugs. He is also the author of "The Antidepressant Factbook.
Dr. Breggin says, "There is no evidence whatsoever that depression is caused by a biochemical imbalance."
He states that he is outraged, "that so many people have been damaged or killed by the effects of the false biochemical diagnoses and toxic medications."
Researchers say getting studies with negative findings on SSRIs published is like pulling teeth. For instance, it took 18 months to get a study published in the September 2006 journal, Public Library of Science (PLoS), that determined that SSRIs can cause some people to become violent and even homicidal.
Dr Healy and David Menkes from Cardiff University in Britain, and Andrew Herxheimer from the Cochrane Centre, conducted the study to determine the risk of violent behavior in people taking SSRIs.
Dr Healy reports that, "even though PLoS is braver than most journals and less influenced by industry than most, it still took close to 18 months for this article to appear."
"However," he states, "they left out the group that deserves the highest level of protection - pregnant mothers and their unborn children."
According to Ms Curry, the belief that depression is actually a "deficiency" disease, akin to diabetes, has been so aggressively promoted that there is frequently an "uncritical acceptance" of the value of prescribing SSRIs, even for children.
"There is no scientific evidence that there is a serotonin "imbalance" in people who are depressed," she says, "that they have a serotonin dysfunction or that they need serotonin drugs to operate normally."
"There are trillions of synapses in the brain and hundreds of brain chemicals," she notes. "Little is known about how these chemicals inter-relate or act on neurons."
In "Serotonin and Depression: A Disconnect between the Advertisements and the Scientific Literature," published in the November 2005, Public Library of Science Journal, Jeffrey Lacasse, of the Florida State University College of Social Work, and Jonathan Leo, of the Lake Erie College of Osteopathic Medicine, state: "To our knowledge, there is not a single peer-reviewed article that can be accurately cited to directly support claims of serotonin deficiency in any mental disorder, while there are many articles that present counterevidence."
"Furthermore," the authors note, "the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), which is published by the American Psychiatric Association and contains the definitions of all psychiatric diagnoses, does not list serotonin as a cause of any mental disorder."
According to the article, the American Psychiatric Press Textbook of Clinical Psychiatry addresses serotonin deficiency as an unconfirmed hypothesis, stating, "Additional experience has not confirmed the monoamine depletion hypothesis"
"In short," the PLoS article states, "there exists no rigorous corroboration of the serotonin theory, and a significant body of contradictory evidence."
For thirty years, Harvard trained psychiatrist, Dr. Peter Breggin has served as an expert in civil and criminal actions against the manufacturers of psychiatric drugs. His work has provided the scientific basis for the original combined Prozac litigation and label changes on many psychiatric drugs. He is also the author of "The Antidepressant Factbook.
Dr. Breggin says, "There is no evidence whatsoever that depression is caused by a biochemical imbalance."
He states that he is outraged, "that so many people have been damaged or killed by the effects of the false biochemical diagnoses and toxic medications."
Researchers say getting studies with negative findings on SSRIs published is like pulling teeth. For instance, it took 18 months to get a study published in the September 2006 journal, Public Library of Science (PLoS), that determined that SSRIs can cause some people to become violent and even homicidal.
Dr Healy and David Menkes from Cardiff University in Britain, and Andrew Herxheimer from the Cochrane Centre, conducted the study to determine the risk of violent behavior in people taking SSRIs.
Dr Healy reports that, "even though PLoS is braver than most journals and less influenced by industry than most, it still took close to 18 months for this article to appear."
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