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This is what's wrong with mental health parity
by Douglas A. Smith, Antipsychiatry Coalition activist
and webmaster
of http://antipsychiatry.org
A mental health parity law forcing health insurance companies to pay for mental health care would be wrong for several
reasons.
First, the concept of mental illness itself
is flawed and misleading. As psychiatrist E. Fuller Torrey wrote in his book The Death of Psychiatry in 1974: "The
very term ['mental disease'] is nonsensical, a semantic mistake. The two words cannot go together except metaphorically; you
can no more have a mental 'disease' than you can have a purple idea or a wise space."1 [Note from FFPS: This was
back in 1974. E.F.Torrey is now the most vehement pro-force biomedical psychiatrist in the country.]
Mental illnesses do not exist in the same sense
that physical illnesses do. Physical illnesses have known physical causes. Mental illnesses do not.
In his book Toxic Psychiatry, published
in 1991, psychiatrist Peter Breggin, M.D., said "there is no evidence that any of the common psychological or psychiatric
disorders have a genetic or biological component."2
In their book Your Drug May Be Your Problem:
How and Why to Stop Taking Psychiatric Drugs in 1999, Drs. Peter Breggin, M.D., and David Cohen, Ph.D., said: "...there's
no substantial evidence that any psychiatric diagnoses have a physical basis."3
In his book Blaming the Brain: The Truth
About Drugs and Mental Health, published in 1998, Elliot S. Valenstein, Ph.D., Professor Emeritus of Psychology and Neuroscience
at the University of Michigan, said: "Contrary to what is often claimed, no biochemical, anatomical, or functional signs have
been found that reliably distinguish the brains of mental patients."4
In his book The Complete Guide to Psychiatric
Drugs, published in 2000, Edward Drummond, M.D., Associate Medical Director at the Seacoast Mental Health Center in Portsmouth,
N.H., said: "First, no biological etiology has been proven for any psychiatric disorder (except Alzheimer's disease, which
has a genetic component) in spite of decades of research. ... So don't accept the myth that we can make an 'accurate diagnosis.'"5
Alzheimer's is not generally considered a mental illness.
No
psychiatric problem falls within a reasonable definition of the word disease. In her book about fibromyalgia, Miryam
Williamson said "A disease is a condition that has a known cause and can be identified by one or another set of laboratory
tests."6
By this definition, no mental illness can be
called a "disease."
As Harvard-trained psychiatrist
Loren R. Mosher, M.D., said in 1998, "there are no external validating criteria for psychiatric diagnoses. There is neither a blood
test nor specific anatomic lesions for any major psychiatric disorder."7
In his book Prozac Backlash, published
in 2000, Joseph Glenmullen, M.D., clinical instructor in psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, said "In medicine, strict criteria
exist for calling a condition a disease. In addition to a predictable cluster of symptoms, the cause of the symptoms or some
understanding of their physiology must be established. ... Psychiatry is unique among medical specialties in that... We do
not yet have proof either of the cause or the physiology for any psychiatric diagnosis. ... In recent decades, we have had
no shortage of alleged biochemical imbalances for psychiatric conditions. Diligent though these attempts have been, not one
has been proven.
Quite the contrary. In every instance where
such an imbalance was thought to have been found, it was later proven false. ... No claim of a gene for a psychiatric condition
has stood the test of time, in spite of popular misinformation."8
Or as Edward Drummond, M.D., said in his book The
Complete Guide to Psychiatric Drugs, published in 2000: "Psychiatric disorders are vastly different from physical disorders,
however, because our understanding of how the normal brain works is incomplete. ... The treatment you receive depends on the
orientation of your psychiatrist, not on a solid foundation of knowledge about the etiology and pathogenesis of the disorder
itself."9
A similar observation was made by Columbia University
psychiatry professor Jerrold S. Maxmen, M.D., in his book The New Psychiatry in 1985, an observation that remains true
today: "It is generally unrecognized that psychiatrists are the only medical specialists who treat disorders that,
by definition, have no definitively known causes or cures. ... A diagnosis should indicate the cause of a mental disorder,
but as discussed later, since the etiologies of most mental disorders are unknown, current diagnostic systems can't reflect
them."10
In 1999 neurologist Fred A. Baughman, M.D.,
said: "The country's been led to believe that all painful emotions are a mental illness and the leadership of the APA [American
Psychiatric Association] knows very well that they are representing it as a disease when there is no scientific data to confirm
any mental illness."11
Forty-one years ago in his classic book,
The Myth of Mental Illness, psychiatry professor Thomas S. Szasz, M.D., said "It is customary to define psychiatry
as a medical specialty concerned with the study, diagnosis, and treatment of mental illnesses. This is a worthless and misleading
definition. Mental illness is a myth. Psychiatrists are not concerned with mental illnesses and their treatments. In actual
practice they deal with personal, social, and ethical problems in living."12
Should there be a federal law (or state
laws) requiring health insurance companies to pay for "therapy" for mere problems in living? In his interview on CBS television's
60 Minutes on April 21, 2002, psychiatrist E. Fuller Torrey, M.D., said no.
He argued that so-called therapy for mere problems
in living is not health care. He said "problems of living" are matters such as "why is your third wife divorcing you, or why
were you passed over for office chief, or why won't your teenage daughter talk to you." He said "I'm not saying that these
are not problems. They are problems. But I'm saying that I don't think that medical resources or medical insurance should
be used to cover why your teenage daughter won't talk to you." State or federal laws requiring parity for mental health treatment
would require medical insurance to pay for counselling or "psychotherapy" or other therapy such as (supposedly) antidepressant
drugs for such problems.
In his June 19, 2002 article in The Hill
advocating enactment of a federal mental health parity law, Senator Paul Wellstone said "it is not the business of Congress
to establish the specific definition of mental illness... Instead, we must rely on the scientific and medical standard on
mental illness - the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM) [published and revised every few years by the American Psychiatric
Association] - to define what should be covered" by health insurance.
In 1998, psychiatrist Loren Mosher, M.D., said the "DSM IV [fourth edition] is the fabrication upon which psychiatry
seeks acceptance by medicine in general. Insiders know it is more a political than scientific document."13
In 1996 psychiatrist David Kaiser, M.D., called
the DSM "perhaps one of the greatest sophistries psychiatry has pulled off in its illustrious history of sophistries ... For
those who do serious work with patients, this manual is useless."14
A problem with requiring health insurance coverage
for all diagnoses in the DSM was pointed out by Sydney Walker III, M.D., who is both a neurologist and a psychiatrist, in
his book A Dose of Sanity, in 1996: The "DSM's ever-increasing list of conditions makes it easy for therapists to spot
pathology where none exists."15
In another book, The Hyperactivity Hoax,
in 1998, Dr. Walker said: "The other major flaw of the DSM, related to the first, is that it labels virtually everything
as some type of disorder. Thus a child who sees a DSM-oriented doctor is almost assured of a psychiatric label and a prescription,
even if the child is perfectly fine. ... individual DSM labels include so many vague criteria that almost anyone can qualify.
... This willy-nilly labeling of virtually everyone as mentally ill is a serious danger to healthy children, because virtually
all children have enough symptoms to get a DSM label and a drug."16
Anyone who thinks every so-called mental illness
in the American Psychiatric Association's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) should be covered
by health insurance should take a look at the book. In it you will find such matters as inability to express oneself well
in writing (disorder of written expression, diagnosis number 315.2) or lack of sexual desire (hypoactive sexual desire disorder)
are - amazingly enough - considered to be mental disorders.
If "therapy" for everything listed as a disorder in
the DSM must, by law, be paid for by health insurance, there is almost no limit to what types of problems must be covered
by health insurance, including those that are well within the range of normal human thinking and behavior or which are the
normal emotional consequences of disappointments or frustrations of life - not true health problems.
The simple truth about psychiatry said twenty
years ago by Harvard Law School professor Alan M. Dershowitz remains true today. He said psychiatry "is not a scientific discipline."17
Current mental health treatment is not merely
unscientific. It is harmful, partly because of its erroneous biological orientation and resulting reliance on psychiatric
drugs and electric shock treatment, both of which are still being administered to unwilling as well as voluntary patients.
In the words of psychiatrist Peter Breggin,
M.D., in 2000:
Nothing has harmed the quality of individual life in
modern society more than the misbegotten belief that human suffering is driven by biological and genetic causes and can be
rectified by taking drugs or undergoing electroshock therapy. ... If I wanted to ruin someone's life, I would convince the
person that biological psychiatry is right - that relationships mean nothing, that choice is impossible, and that the mechanics
of a broken brain reign over our emotions and conduct. If I wanted to impair an individual's capacity to create empathetic,
loving relationships, I would prescribe psychiatric drugs, all of which blunt our highest psychological and spiritual functions.18
He also said "All psychiatric drugs produce
severe biochemical imbalances and related abnormalities by interfering with the normal brain function."19
In a book published in 2001 he said: "If a drug
has an effect on the brain, it is harming the brain. Science has not found or synthesized any psychoactive substances that
improve normal brain function. Instead, all of them impair brain function."20
Many commonly prescribed psychiatric drugs
cause permanent brain damage. These include neuroleptics, often called major tranquilizers or antipsychotics,
and antidepressants, both the tricyclic and selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor or SSRI types.
In his book Prozac Backlash in 2000,
psychiatrist Joseph Glenmullen, M.D., says these drugs "are toxic to the brain" and because of their "neurotoxicity" may be
"damaging or destroying critical parts of the brain."
He says "The unfortunate irony is that drugs heavily promoted as correcting
unproven biochemical imbalances may, in fact, be causing imbalances and brain damage"21
He says "In recent years, the danger of long-term
side effects has emerged in association with Prozac-type drugs, making it imperative to minimize one's exposure to them. Neurological
disorders including disfiguring facial and whole body tics, indicating potential brain damage, are an increasing concern with
patients on the drugs. ... With related drugs targeting serotonin, there is evidence that they may effect a 'chemical lobotomy'
by destroying the nerve endings that they target in the brain."22
A U.S. Court of Appeals judge reviewed the
evidence and then reached this conclusion: "Unlike the temporary and predictable effects of bodily restraints, the permanent
side effects of antipsychotic drugs induce conditions that cannot be corrected simply by cessation of the regimen. The permanency
of these effects is analogous to that resulting from such radical surgical procedures as a pre-frontal lobotomy."23
In his book Molecules of the Mind: The
Brave New Science of Molecular Psychology, University of Maryland journalism professor Jon Franklin observed: "This era
coincided with an increasing awareness that the neuroleptics not only did not cure schizophrenia - they actually caused damage
to the brain.
Suddenly, the psychiatrists who used them, already
like their patients on the fringes of society, were suspected of Nazism and worse."24
In his book Psychiatric Drugs: Hazards
to the Brain, psychiatrist Peter Breggin, M.D., alleges that by using drugs that cause brain damage, "Psychiatry has unleashed
an epidemic of neurological disease on the world" one which "reaches 1 million to 2 million persons a year."25
Neuroleptic drugs also cause thousands of
deaths each year from neuroleptic malignant syndrome. Neurological injury and death inflicted by these drugs has not stopped
the FDA from approving them nor psychiatrists from prescribing them, however.
Psychiatrists have even supported the recent
enactment of "outpatient commitment" laws in the U.S., the main purpose of which is to force people to take these
harmful psychiatric drugs while living outside psychiatric institutions.
Psychiatrists also play a central role in
persuading U.S. courts to authorize forced administration of these harmful psychiatric drugs to hospitalized patients.
The proposals for mandatory coverage of mental
health treatment would force health insurers to pay for prescription of these harmful psychiatric drugs and for electric shock
treatment, now often called electroconvulsive therapy or ECT.
ECT is now used mostly for depression. According
to Maurice Victor, M.D., Professor of Medicine and Neurology, Dartmouth Medical School, and Allan H. Ropper, M.D., Professor
and Chairman of Neurology, Tufts University School of Medicine, in their textbook Adams and Victor's Principles of Neurology,
published in 2001: "The mechanism by which ECT produces it effects is not known."26
But in truth, the way ECT produces its effects
is known: It damages the patient's brain sufficiently to prevent him from remembering or appreciating whatever was
upsetting him. It has been scientifically shown that ECT causes both temporary and permanent brain damage.
Of course, these findings are vehemently denied
by psychiatrists who administer ECT.
Brain damage from ECT includes cerebral hemorrhages
(abnormal bleeding), edema (excessive accumulation of fluid), cortical atrophy (shrinkage of the cerebral cortex, or outer
layers of the brain), dilated perivascular spaces in the brain, fibrosis (thickening and scarring), gliosis (growth of abnormal
tissue), and rarefied and partially destroyed brain tissue.
The scientific evidence proving this is summarized
in a book, Electroshock: Its Brain Disabling Effects, by psychiatrist Peter Breggin, M.D.27 This brain damage causes
loss of memory and intelligence, some of which is temporary and some of which is permanent.
The late Sidney Sament, M.D., a neurologist,
described ECT this way: "Electroconvulsive therapy in effect may be defined as a controlled type of brain damage produced
by electrical means. No doubt some psychiatric symptoms are eliminated ... but this is at the expense of brain damage."28
We should not have laws mandating health insurance
coverage for this cruel and harmful therapy.
That these "therapies" are offered to
gullible, ignorant, and trusting patients is bad enough, but mental health parity legislation would go a step further and
force insurers to pay for involuntary mental health treatment.
In the past, involuntary mental health treatment
has often been imposed unnecessarily and without justification, and this problem continues today. This is a violation of human
rights, and it will probably become more widespread if insurance coverage for involuntary mental health treatment is mandated
by law.
A U.S. Congressional investigation in 1992
found "that thousands of adolescents, children, and adults have been hospitalized for psychiatric treatment they didn't need;
that hospitals hire bounty hunters to kidnap patients with mental health insurance; that patients are kept against their will
until their insurance benefits run out; that psychiatrists are being pressured by the hospitals to increase profit; that hospitals
'infiltrate' schools by paying kickbacks to school counselors who deliver students; that bonuses are paid to hospital employees,
including psychiatrists, for keeping the hospital beds filled; and that military dependents are being targeted for their generous
mental health benefits."29
According to an article in the August 3, 1992
Investor's Business Daily: "Last Thursday...eight major insurance companies sued NME [National Medical Enterprises]
for alleged fraud involving hundreds of millions of dollars in psychiatric hospital claims.
Their complaint, filed in federal court in
Washington, accused the company of a 'massive' scheme to admit and treat thousands of patients regardless of their need for
care. ...some institutions were paying 'bounty fees' for patient referrals or misdiagnosing patients to get maximum reimbursement."30
Time magazine later reported NME settled the case for a record $300 million.31
An article in the September 15, 1992 New
York Newsday about a similar suit filed in Dallas, Texas said: "Two of the country's largest insurance companies filed
suit yesterday against a national chain of private psychiatric and substance abuse hospitals, charging it with illegally admitting
patients who did not need treatment and then not releasing them until their insurance benefits ran out."32
According to Edward Drummond, M.D., in his
book The Complete Guide to Psychiatric Drugs, published in 2000: "Some psychiatric hospitals made a practice of admitting
adolescents in distress, using the diagnosis of bipolar disorder inappropriately in order to increase their billing to insurance
companies. This practice was so widespread that the federal government finally intervened, charging the hospitals with fraud
and assessing fines of millions of dollars."33
In other words, what is called mental
health care is an attempt to deal with matters that are not true health problems with harmful treatments that are often imposed
by force against innocent people.
Under the Tenth Amendment, Congress
has no constitutional authority to enact legislation requiring health insurers throughout the nation to provide equal coverage
for mental health care. Even it did, however, it would be illogical, unwise, and wrong for Congress to do so.
Congress should not promote psychiatry's unscientific,
harmful, and unethical treatment with a mental health parity law.
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REFERENCES
1. E. Fuller Torrey, The Death of Psychiatry (Penguin Books, 1974), p.
36
2. Peter R. Breggin, M.D., Toxic Psychiatry (St. Martin's Press, 1991), p. 291
3. Peter R. Breggin, M.D. &
David Cohen, Ph.D., Your Drug May Be Your Problem: How and Why to Stop Taking Psychiatric Drugs (Perseus Books - Reading,
Massachusetts - 1999), page 93
4. Elliot S. Valenstein, Ph.D., Blaming the Brain: The Truth About Drugs and Mental Health
(The Free Press, New York, 1998), p. 125
5. Edward Drummond, M.D., The Complete Guide to Psychiatric Drugs (John
Wiley & Sons, Inc., New York, 2000), page 15-16.
6. Miryam Williamson, Fibromyalgia: A Comprehensive Approach,
in an excerpt from the book appearing at http://pinksunrise.com/mta/williamson2.htm, accessed 6/6/02
7. From a letter dated
December 4, 1998 by Loren R. Mosher, M.D., a psychiatrist, resigning from the American Psychiatric Association, available
on the internet at http://www.oikos.org/mosher.htm.
8. Joseph Glenmullen, M.D., Prozac Backlash (Simon & Schuster,
New York, 2000), pages 192-193, page 196
9. Edward Drummond, M.D., The Complete Guide to Psychiatric Drugs, (John
Wiley & Sons, Inc., New York, 2000), pages 8-9
10. Jerrold S. Maxmen, M.D., The New Psychiatry (Mentor, 1985)
pages 19 & 36 - italics in original
11. Fred A. Baughman, M.D., quoted in Insight magazine, June 28, 1999, p.
13
12. Thomas S. Szasz, M.D., The Myth of Mental Illness: Foundations of a Theory of Personal Conduct (Dell Publishing
Co., New York, 1961), p. 296.
13. From a letter dated December 4, 1998 by Loren R. Mosher, M.D., a psychiatrist, resigning
from the American Psychiatric Association, available on the internet at http://www.oikos.org/mosher.htm.
14. David Kaiser,
M.D., "Commentary: Against Biologic Psychiatry," Psychiatric Times, December 1996, available on the Internet at http://www.mhsource.com/pt/p961242.html,
accessed July 7, 2002.
15. Sydney Walker III, M.D., A Dose of Sanity (John Wiley & Sons, New York, 1996), p.
128
16. Sydney Walker III, M.D., The Hyperactivity Hoax (Springer 1998), pages 23-24 - italics in original
17.
Alan Dershowitz quoted in "Clash of Testimony in Hinckley Trial Has Psychiatrists Worried Over Image", The New York Times,
May 24, 1982, p. 11
18. Peter R. Breggin, M.D., in the foreword to Reality Therapy in Action by William Glasser,
M.D. (Harper Collins, 2000), p. xi
19. Peter R. Breggin, M.D., Reclaiming Our Children (Perseus Books, Cambridge,
Mass., 2000), page 140
20. Peter R. Breggin, M.D., The Antidepressant Fact Book - What Your Doctor Won't Tell You About
Prozac, Zoloft, Paxil, Celexa, and Luvox (Perseus Publishing - Cambridge, Massachusetts, 2000) p. 168
21. Joseph Glenmullen,
M.D., Prozac Backlash (Simon & Schuster, New York, 2000) pages 49 & 94
22. Joseph Glenmullen, M.D., Prozac
Backlash (Simon & Schuster, New York, 2000), p. 8
23. Rennie v. Klein, 720 F.2d 266, 276 (3d Cir., 1983, quoted
in Douglas S. Stransky, University of Miami Law Review, "Civil Commitment and the Right to Refuse Treatment..." Vol.
50:413, 434, note 135
24. Jon Franklin, Molecules of the Mind: The Brave New Science of Molecular Psychology (Dell
Pub. Co., 1987) p. 103
25. Peter Breggin, M.D., Psychiatric Drugs: Hazards to the Brain (Springer Pub. Co., New
York, 1983), pages 109 & 108
26. Maurice Victor, M.D., and Allan H. Ropper, M.D., Adams and Victor's Principles
of Neurology - Seventh Edition (McGraw-Hill Medical Publishing Division, New York, 2001), page 1620
27. Peter R. Breggin,
M.D., Electroshock: It's Brain Disabling Effects (Springer 1979)
28. Sidney Sament, M.D., Clinical Psychiatry
News, March 1983, p. 4
29. quoted in: Lynn Payer, Disease-Mongers: How Doctors, Drug Companies, and Insurers Are
Making You Feel Sick (John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 1992, pp. 234-235
30. Christine Shenot, "Bleeder at National Medical
Insurers Cry Of 'Fraud' Reopened A Big Wound", Investor's Business Daily, Monday, August 3, 1992, p. 1, quoted in "Unjustified
Psychiatric Commitment in the U.S.A." by Lawrence Stevens, J.D., www.antipsychiatry.org/unjustif.htm, accessed 7/1/02
31.
Time magazine, April 25, 1994, p. 24
32. Michael Unger, "Hospitals Called Cheats - Insurers say health-care chain
pulled off nationwide scam", New York Newsday, Thursday, September 15, 1992, Business section, page 33, quoted in "Unjustified
Psychiatric Commitment in the U.S.A." by Lawrence Stevens, J.D., www.antipsychiatry.org/unjustif.htm, accessed 7/1/02
33.
Edward Drummond, M.D., The Complete Guide to Psychiatric Drugs (John Wiley & Sons, Inc., New York, 2000), pages
13-14
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