Non Responders

In my efforts to obtain support for this campaign (to get compo for users of A-Typicals who contract Diabetes), I wrote to the following leading politicians and mental health academics, campaigners and journalists. All but one (now two) failed to acknoweldge my letter. Even a follow up letter was ignored:

Professor Appleby (DoH) – no response.
Zac Goldsmith MP – no response.
Ron Coleman (Campaigner) – no response.
Prof Fulford (University of Warwick and Oxford) – no response.
Richard Bentall, University of Manchester – no response.
Ed Milliband – responded - has written to MHRA (09/11/11).
Lord Jones – no response.
Paul Farmer (Mind) – responded and are helping me.
Marjorie Wallace (Sane) – no response.
Paul Jenkins, (Rethink) – no response.

Ben Goldacre - The Guardian - no response.

And just today leading psychaitrist Dr Alex Mitchell said he would be happy to help (see http://www.psycho-oncology.info/). Still waiting for the others...

Download the letter here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1zI4AYpNDKIsayIFmRCzkemBSz_5c2czXvBpriGSG1LA/edit

An Open Letter to Eli Lilly

Eli Lilly set up a compensation fund in the US for $750m, to compensate users of its drug who contracted diabetes. This was done a while ago, but UK sufferers don't get a penny. Why? Because UK law is rubbish. It requires such a high level of evidence that solicitors won't touch it and even if they did on the basis of the law, and the strength of the evidence, the government, keen to slash budgets don't want to fund these types of cases anymore. So, Eli Lilly et al get away with pushing a drug that kills you.

The mentally ill are kind of special on this particular issue, simply because when elderly users, who were prescribed A-Typical medication to control symptoms of dementia (incidentally this was the starting point for anti-psychotic drugs), they came down hard on care homes and doctors using them to treat the older patients. The older patients were dying earlier than they should, via strokes, heart attacks and the like. But when it comes to the mentally ill, that fear factor I've discussed excludes the mentally ill from protection, simply because the various authorities desire the mentally ill to be medicated up to the eye balls rather than running around killing strangers. They'd rather have a sedated, quiet patient with diabetes, or a dead patient, than a patient killing people and generally causing havoc.

I know it all sounds very cynical. But I have experienced this first hand. I know what I am talking about.

Another Death - Another Lost Friend

I mentioned my friend Kerry (not her real name), in an earlier post. She was in her thirties and suffering from cancer. She collasped and died last month from a Deep Vien Thrombosis. It is another tragic sign that the pills are killing us and the system stands by and does nothing. She leaves her boyfriend and her sister and parents behind, who may or may not realise that her pills contributed significantly to her death. And the tradegies continue...

The Green M: The Battle for Freedom and Justice in Psychiatry

If you're visiting this site as the result of a letter I've sent to you, please do pick up my book which goes into a lot more detail. It is an ebook only and really pushes the boundaries of psychiatry and asks the professionals to get their act together. The list of stuff that needs to change is so long and the road to freedom and justice isn't blocked by anything other than fear: fear of the mentally ill, that in reality isn't justified...

http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/67050

Thanks.

Human Rights Stuff

The government has published a response on the Declartion of Human Rights - rights for disabled people, paper published by the UN Commissioner, this month. Interested groups were given a chance to comment on this document, which ran out yesterday. However, I heard from the Office of Disabily Issues, that the deadline has now been extended to the 25th July 2011, which obviously is good news. You can visit the document here: http://www.odi.gov.uk/un-report.

Welcome to the Battle.

Psychiatry is young. It isn't much of science unless it hooks up with neurology, and it is still abusing the rights and freedoms of the mentally ill on a daily basis. This blog will cover some aspects of my fight to have the mental health law reviewed, and to have treatment changed, to reflect what we now know, or more realistically what we don't know about the dopamine theory of illness.

Firstly I believe that dopamine maybe the problem, but that the blocking of dopamine, may not be the answer. The blocking of dopamine has only a short term benefit and in the long term stifles the healing process.

Secondly I believe that the internment without trial and forced treatment of mentally ill people is illegal and unnecessary in most cases. The key document that supports this view can be found on the Universal Declaration of Human Rights page, written by the UN Commissioner for Human Rights.

I will not be posting everything that happens in this battle, because I have to use my own case to push for these changes. Some of it is private. But I have engaged in correspondence with several governmental and non-governmental agencies and organisations already on this issue and I have so far not really got the answers I was seeking. But there have been some surprises along the way, of which I will keep you posted.

Please do download and read my book The Green 'M': The Battle for Freedom and Justice in Psychiatry, as this is the document that I will be using as a keystone, around which all the arguments will be put forward. Seeking the balance for freedom, whilst controlling the worst of the illness in its sufferers is a large part of that battle, along with holding back societies tendency to see all mentally ill people as a threat to the safety of the community in which we live and are desperate to take an active part in, but are preventing from doing so, because of other peoples prejudices.