A couple of you have noted that the ADAA [Anxiety Disorders Association of America] itself has its own PHARMA ties. So I started searching their 2009 Annual Conference that was on my screen for familiar names: Charles Nemeroff, Alan Schatzberg, and Karen Wagner on the Scientific Advisory Board; Martin Keller, Joseph Biederman, and Dennis Charney were in the house presenting. That was enough for me, so I moved on. Altostrata points out:
Corporate ContributionsADAA received unrestricted educational grants and donations in support of consumer and professional education from the following:
AstraZeneca
Jazz Pharmaceuticals
Pfizer Inc.
Takeda Pharmaceuticals
Wiley-Blackwell
I don’t like being as cynical as I’ve become about organizations like ADAA [Anxiety Disorders Association of America], or NAMI [National Alliance on Mental Illness], or the AFSP [American Foundation for Suicide Prevention]. I’m sure that some were founded altruistically, and do some good things, but they’re easily invaded and become a conduit for the pharma·soot·ical industry. Some, but not all, like NAMI are followed by Sourcewatch. The ADAA was written up by Citizens Commission on Human Rights International and it’s a devastating report [hat tip to Talbot] leaving little to the imagination. The CCHRI site lists other Psycho/Pharma Front Groups. These seemingly Grass Roots organizations that are shady are known as Astroturf [I wish I had thought up that name]:
… refers to apparently grassroots-based citizen groups or coalitions that are primarily conceived, created and/or funded by corporations, industry trade associations, political interests or public relations firms.
If anybody knows of other listings of such organizations that have to do with Mental Health or other candidates, let us all know. It’s just not an area I’m familiar with. But the point I set out to make is that what the last post and all of this means is that Charlie Nemeroff is still in the game…
The CCHRI “was co-founded as an independent mental health watchdog in 1969 by the Church of Scientology and Professor of Psychiatry Emeritus Dr. Thomas Szasz...” It’s really dubious to have them on ones side.
During my first and hopefully last psychotic break (which I consider to be a brief reactive psychosis that cleared itself up within four days and would have cleared up sooner had I not been given drugs that put me into a stupor that I don’t even remember) a social worker advised my friend to go to the NAMI website to get information about bipolar disorder as if it were a legitimate medical resource and not a front company for drug lobbyists. This is an organization that diagnosed Abraham Lincoln with clinical depression. The idea that a man of conscience who, as President of the U.S. , was responsible for the Civil War would not be seriously disturbed and floored with grief over it it unless he were mentally ill is anti-social on its face.
As far as I’m concerned, if an organization promotes biological psychiatry and medicine as the primary solution for a host of newly discovered mental illnesses, it’s a money-laundering operation that advertises money making schemes for drug companies and prescribing professionals who want to make a lot of money playing brain doctors.
Charles Nemeroff, wears many hats, here he is today in the news (quoted)
“Depression worsens the effect of other illnesses,†says Charles Nemeroff, a geriatric psychiatrist at the University of Miami. “People with depression are more vulnerable to [disease], and once it happens, it’s worse.â€
Since when was he a geriatric psych? Jack of all trades, recycled BS he is omnipresent lol.
WA PO
http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/depression-often-goes-undiagnosed-but-new-medicare-benefit-may-change-that/2012/04/02/gIQAEbzJrS_story.html
And, he also says depression worsens cancer outcomes:
“Depression worsens the outcome of breast cancer. There’s no doubt about it,” said the University of Miami’s Dr. Charles Nemeroff, an advocate for early and aggressive treatment of depression.”
http://www.mtexpress.com/index2.php?ID=2005141161
These Astroturfed psychiatric organizations issue interlocking messages, tending towards making “treatment” accessible to everyone — meaning, don’t restrict the drugs, everyone needs them even if they aren’t very effective.
They’re also disease-mongerers, issuing lots of ridiculous statistics, such as 40% of college students have mental illnesses, adding public relations support to campaigns to screen for and “treat” (aka medicate) mental illness in the general population.
This site has US IRS Forms 990 for nonprofits http://www2.guidestar.org/Home.aspx. If you look at the section for donations, you can see to what extent they are supported by pharma.
NAMI is both good and bad. They have deeply hurt some of my friends. But also some of my friends who have spend a lifetime working for NAMI are now some of my best allies in spreading the view of emotional suffering as temporary distress and not permanent disease.
Let’s try to dig deeper with this story: http://wellnesswordworks.com/nami-mental-health-advocacy/
I actually wrote this blog in response to this post and all the other reflexive NAMI bashing I see out there, but it was held up by a long email exchange with one of their national board members. She has been rapidly spreading Robert Whitaker’s message of “Medications help some but hurt others and may be increasing disability.” But all NAMI members are individuals and their ideas are much stronger than any theoretical group thinking.
Corinna, the purpose of pharma contributions to Astroturfed organizations like NAMI is to exploit the goodwill of the authentic grassroots folks to burnish its own image.
Supposedly altruistic gestures such as funding volunteer training BUY the good opinion of volunteers, such as the person who has kind words for AstraZeneca although a year ago it paid $520,000 in fines for pushing Seroquel. The NYTimes called this “the biggest criminal fine of any type in United States history.”
In public relations, these kinds of gestures are supposed to cast a “halo effect” over the company and its products. Here http://wellnesswordworks.com/nami-mental-health-advocacy/#comment-862 we have evidence the money pharma has thrown at NAMI has been quite effective! Your commenter has publicly commended AstraZeneca for its public-spiritedness.
Volunteers in Astroturfed organizations will have to contend with their own cognitive dissonance. “Yes, we get money from pharma, but we do good with it!” Quid pro quo always buys something, even if one party doesn’t want to admit it.
Thought this post was a joke when I read it at first. CCHRI are a notorious astroturf front group for Scientology. Any list of shady organisations with fake front groups would have them right at the top.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_Commission_on_Human_Rights
Please don’t let justified antipathy towards big pharma blind you to other sources of harm in society.
More information here. Patients groups infiltrated by pharma is one thing, but the CCHR is incredibly unhinged and dangerous.
http://www.lisamcpherson.org/cchr.htm