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CTM
Eclub digest version, November 21st 2004
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Britain Signs up to Fast-Track EU Arrests The New European Arrest warrant came into force yesterday, allowing British citizens to be extradited under a fast track process even if their actions do not constitute an offence in Britain. The scheme initially applies to only seven countries but will later expand to include all EU members. There has been widespread concern that British citizens' right to a fair trial will be endangered by the removal of many of the previous extradition safeguards. These fears will be magnified after May, when the European Union admits 10 new members - mostly former communist countries in central and eastern Europe. "We are very worried about some of the accession countries," said Stephen Jakobi, director of the lobby group Fair Trials Abroad. "Poland and Hungary have good standards, but the impression we are getting is that there are a lot of problems with corruption in the judicial systems of some of the incoming states." Many of the new members have come under attack from the European Commission for the desperately slow pace of justice. David Davis, the shadow home secretary, told The Daily Telegraph, "It is ludicrous that people can be extradited for an action that may not be an offence in this country. The more countries that become involved, some having only a short acquaintance with democracy, the more serious the problem becomes." The new warrant - rushed through as an anti-terrorist response to September 11 attacks on America - is seen by the Home Office as an important step in preventing criminals escaping justice by going to another country. But it has had a faltering start. Only eight countries of the current 15 EU states have so far adopted it in time for the launch yesterday: Britain, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Ireland, Portugal, Spain and Sweden. The Government hopes the rest will join by Easter. The Government argues that the warrant will speed up the cumbersome extradition process while ensuring that a suspect's basic rights - including a limited right of appeal to the House of Lords - are protected by British judges. In particular, it says that the European warrant will deny fugitives from British justice a safe haven in states that previously refused to extradite their own citizens - including Denmark, France, Germany, Greece and Luxembourg. But critics argue that the central assumption of the new warrant - that the justice systems in all European countries are equally fair - is deeply flawed. Mr Jakobi describes a "two-tier" system of justice in Europe, based on the experience of more than 1,000 cases taken up by Fair Trials Abroad. He places Britain, Scandinavian countries, Germany, the Netherlands, Austria and Ireland in the "top group" of states where a European arrest warrant could work well. But he maintains that in other countries - including France, Belgium, Spain and Greece - a foreigner is almost always convicted regardless of the evidence. The European arrest warrant extends well beyond terrorist-related cases to all offences that carry a sentence of a year or more in the country seeking an extradition. Many of the offences, such as murder, grievous bodily injury, rape arson, armed robbery, kidnapping, racketeering and trafficking in drugs or weapons are uncontroversial. But there are also ambiguous crimes such as racism and xenophobia, that are interpreted differently in different countries. The most significant change is the abolition in most
cases of "dual criminality" - the requirement that a
person can only be extradited for an action to be considered an offence
in both the country seeking extradition and the country being asked to
surrender a suspect. PHILLIP DAY'S COMMENT: Upset? Angry? Want to do
something but your Chieftain tank has rusted down the bottom of the garden?
Further Resources: To purchase or for more information: www.credence.org
Europe Plan to Outlaw 'Made in Britain' Label The decades old "Made in Britain" label may be banned on products ranging from stilton cheese to Scottish cashmere, and even Morgan cars, under plans being explored by the European Commission. Industry groups across Europe reacted with outrage yesterday to a Brussels proposal for a "Made in the EU" label to displace the national marks known across the world. The new label is intended to project the image of the European Union and furnish it with the trappings of a powerful global entity. But John Cridland, the deputy director of the CBI, said the idea was counter-productive and would obscure the origin of products, many of which would come from Eastern Europe after EU enlargement in May. "This is not going to help at all to give customers the information they want," he said. Germany's small industry federation (BVMW) described
the idea as a "frontal assault on German quality standards",
predicting that it would have disastrous effects on competitiveness…. Other options cover a dual labelling system that preserves both features, much like the new European passports, or a purely voluntary label for EU-made goods. Mr Lamy's spokesman said: "The 'Made in the
EU' mark would carry a number of advantages: promoting a mark of distinction
and higher visibility for the EU"…. In tune with the commission's strategy of promoting regionalism at the expense of national consciousness, it strongly supports the principle of protected local brands such as rioja wine, parma ham or feta cheese…. The British reacted with deep scepticism, demanding to know why the status quo was not included as a possible option…. Terry Tyrrell, the head of Enterprise IG, the brand consulting group, said the commission idea bordered on marketing madness. "Can you imagine a French perfume carrying a 'Made in the EU' label? It will have a devastating effect on companies that rely on national characteristics to build brand differentiation," he said. The commission is drawing up a detailed study for completion
by March. If this leads to a draft law, the final decision will be taken
by EU ministers under qualified majority voting. Further Resources: To purchase or for more information: www.credence.org
Laid To Waste Over the next 12 months, it is safe to predict, the benefits of Britain's membership of the European Union will become more evident than ever before. The most obvious sign will be the coming into force of more of the edicts already approved by the EU's technocracy, such as the extension in July of the working hours legislation to junior hospital doctors, which NHS trusts across the country have warned will lead to widespread ward closures. Also by July a waste crisis will hit the UK when EC directives reduce the number of landfill sites permitted to take "hazardous waste" from 218 to only 10, most of them in the north-east and none in the south-east or Wales. The effect of this will be compounded by the EC's ever widening definition of "hazardous waste", which now includes paints, old vehicle and electrical equipment such as television sets, computers and mobile phones. As a spokesman for the Environment Services Association
put it last week, with 5 million tonnes of such waste to be disposed of
each year and virtually no where to put it, "the fridge mountain
will pale into insignificance by comparison with what will happen when
this directive bites". Already the difficulties surrounding the
disposal of old cars created by phase one of the End of Life Vehicle (ELV)
Directive have led to hundreds of thousands of vehicles being abandoned
- although, as we learned last week, this may soon be an offence for which
the owner can lose his licence for life. Further Resources: To purchase or for more information: www.credence.org
Under-Arm Sprays Link to Tumours Scientists have discovered the strongest link yet between anti-perspirants and Britain's soaring rate of breast cancer. They detected chemicals in breast tumours which are commonly used in under-arm sprays, make-up and foods. The preservatives, called parabens, are absorbed through skin, a study found. Britons spend £400 million a year on products containing parabens. Although there is no direct evidence that the chemicals lead to cancer, the scientist leading the research says more work is needed to see if they should be used. Dr Philippa Darbre, of Reading University, pointed to the potential risks of long-term deodorant use and of excessive use by teenagers. She said: "Parabens are used as preservatives in thousands of cosmetic, food and pharmaceutical products but this is the first study to show their accumulation in human tissues." The number of breast cancer cases in Britain has doubled in 25 years, with almost 13,000 deaths a year - one of the world's worst rates. However, the cosmetics industry and cancer experts urged people not to panic. The Cosmetic Toiletry and Perfumery Association said 96 per cent of deodorants and anti-perspirants used in Britain do not contain parabens. Cancer Research UK added that 'any notional risk' was
insignificant compared with dangers such as obesity. PHILLIP DAY'S COMMENT: The subject of poisons in our personal care and household products has of course been a subject I have concentrated on for years. Parabens are not the only problems with deodorants and anti-perspirants. There are a whole host of chemicals in these and other products that are provably dangerous and have been the subject of intense investigation. We cover these in our various titles, especially Health Wars and Cancer: Why We're Still Dying to Know the Truth. If you are not completely clear about the 884 toxins in our close environment, of which some 134 cause cancer, please get educated on it today. Further Resources: To purchase or for more information: www.credence.org
Farmed Salmon in Cancer Alert Farmed Atlantic salmon from Scotland contains the highest levels of cancer-causing chemicals in the world, a new survey has found. It is so contaminated that people should eat it no more than once every four months, according to American guidelines. Otherwise it will increase the risk of cancer by at lest one case in 100,000, scientists say. Levels of cancer-causing substances, including PCBs, dioxins, dieldrin and toxaphene, were significantly more concentrated in farmed salmon than in wild fish, said the study published today in Science magazine. Scottish samples of farmed Atlantic salmon were up to 10 times more contaminated than the least contaminated wild salmon: from Kodiak, Alaska. The cause is thought to be contaminated high-fat fish feed. Professor Ronald Hites of Indiana University, who led the study, said: "We think it is more important for people who eat salmon to know that farmed salmon have higher levels of toxins than wild salmon from the open ocean." Professor Barbara Knuth of Cornell University, the co-author of the report, said: "Based on these data, my choice would be, if I were to seek out farm-raised Atlantic salmon, to select north or south American sources. To cut contamination, farms should use feeds with less fish and more plant based material," she said. But Charles Santerre, of Purdue University, Indiana, said the benefits of salmon - a good source of protein, vitamins D and heart-friendly fats - out weighed the risks. "We should be eating more farmed salmon," he said. His point was taken up by Scottish Quality Salmon, which represents about two thirds of Scottish salmon production. It said the advice of the scientists was misleading. Dr John Webster, its technical consultant, said: "Consumers should be reassured by this research, despite its rather obvious attempt to stir anti-fish farm headlines. It says that individual contaminant concentrations in farmed and wild salmon do not exceed US Food and Drug Administration action or tolerance levels. This is true. PCB and dioxin levels in Scottish salmon are significantly lower than the thresholds set by international watchdogs." David Sandison, the general manager of the Shetland Salmon Farmers' Association, said: "PCBs in the diet, a result of industrial pollution between the 1920s and 1970s have fallen by 75 per cent in 20 years." Sir John Krebs, the chairman of the Foods Standard Agency, said the study did not raise any new concerns. "Our advice is that people should consume at least two portions of fish a week, one of these should be oily like salmon. There is good evidence that eating oily fish reduces the risk of death from recurrent heart attacks and that there is a similar effect in relation to first heart attacks. We advise that the known benefits of eating one portion of oily fish outweigh any possible risks." The new study, for which a north American team analysed about 700 farmed and wild salmon, is by far the largest and most comprehensive of its kind. Salmon samples were bought from wholesalers in the world's eight major farmed salmon producing regions and from retailers in nearly 20 major cities. For comparison, the researchers collected samples of five wild Pacific salmon species from north America, which they said could be eaten as often as eight times a month. The study concluded that the contamination problem was likely to be related to salmon feed, a concentrated and high fat mixture of other fish ground into fish meal and fish oil. To make it easier for consumers to follow the consumption advice identified in the study, the authors recommended that all farmed and wild salmon should be clearly labelled and that the country of origin be displayed. Scottish Quality Salmon said, "We have been calling for that for quite some time." Since contaminants build up in fatty tissue, consumers
may be able to reduce contaminants in farmed salmon by removing as much
skin and visible fat as possible. PHILLIP DAY'S COMMENT: Humans eat foods made from animals that are scavengers, such as pork, crab, shellfish, etc. When we eat these tissues, we inherit the toxins the animals scavenged when they were alive. For a list of these foods and the don'ts of food preparation, please see our new expanded recipe and food information title, Food For Thought. To purchase or for more information: www.credence.org
Cinnamon and Cholesterol This spice has been found to reduce blood sugar levels
and cholesterol by up to 20 per cent, according to new research at the
American Department of Agriculture. A teaspoonful might help prevent adult-onset
diabetes, as the active ingredients appear to mimic the effects of insulin. PHILLIP DAY'S COMMENT: Cinnamon is also a great anti-fungal. If you suffer from Candida or other related problems, including those diseases which can be fungal-based, e.g. cancer, diabetes, MS, rheumatism, hypothyroidism (Hashimoto's), etc., please become acquainted with the anti-fungal regimes I discuss in the following. Further Resources: To purchase or for more information: www.credence.org Actual Cost of Making From Dr. Betty Martini From JUDICIAL REFORM INVESTIGATIONS Thanks from another group for sending us the following: In our independent investigation of how much profit drug companies really make, we obtained the actual price of active ingredients used in some of the most popular drugs sold in America. The chart below speaks for itself.
On Monday night, Steve Wilson, an investigative reporter for channel 7 News in Detroit, did a story on generic drug price-gouging by pharmacies. He found in his investigation, that some of these generic drugs were marked up as much as 3,000% or more. Yes, that's not a typo..... three thousand percent! So often, we blame the drug companies for the high cost of drugs, and usually rightfully so. But in this case, the fault clearly lies with the pharmacies themselves. For example, if you had to buy a prescription drug, and bought the name brand, you might pay $100 for 100 pills. The pharmacist might tell you that if you get the generic equivalent, they would only cost $80, making you think you are "saving" $20. What the pharmacist is not telling you is that those 100 generic pills may have only cost him $10! At the end of the report, one of the anchors asked Mr. Wilson whether or not there were any pharmacies that did not adhere to this practice, and he said that Costco consistently charged little over their cost for the generic drugs. I went to the Costco site, where you can look up any drug, and get its online price. It says that the in-store prices are consistent with the online prices. I was appalled. Just to give you one example from my own experience, I had to use the drug, Compazine, which helps prevent nausea in chemo patients. I used the generic equivalent, which cost $54.99 for 60 pills at CVS. I checked the price at Costco, and I could have bought 100 pills for $19.89. For 145 of my pain pills, I paid $72.57. I could have got 150 at Costco for $28.08.I would like to mention, that although Costco is a "membership" type store, you do NOT have to be a member to buy prescriptions there, as it is a federally-regulated substance. You just tell them at the door that you wish to use the pharmacy, and they will let you in. I am asking each of you to please help me by copying
this letter, and pasting it into your own e-mail, and send it to everyone
you know with an e-mail address. Further Resources: Health Wars by Phillip Day To purchase or for more information: www.credence.org Mailbag "'In December 2001 I was diagnosed with cervical
cancer, which by now was at quite an advanced stage. I was immediately
started on three weeks of a double daily dosage of radiotherapy. I was
subsequently informed that this was as far as they could go - that no
further treatment was possible. Also at that time I was feeling quite
poorly, in pain and could not walk unaided. Not much to look forward to. "As a natural healthcare practitioner from Australia and a campaigner for the truth in health and well-being, I am thrilled that you are encompassing such a profound mission, particularly in such a global and diverse manner." - Izabella S., Queensland, Australia "I was a total sceptic; became a total believer. Want more info." - Seamus P., Victoria, Australia "Absolutely fantastic. Good to see and know that the truth is becoming available to people who want to know." - Alberta M., Victoria, Australia "I want to learn more to present more ad to join the growing awareness promotion of "knowledge is power". Let's empower - everyone!" - Diane B., Victoria, Australia "Amazing to hear all the things I have been reading about and learning by experience with the NHS over my own health situation - all put together in one talk. Fantastic! The work is so important and it's so good to know I'm not on my own!! I feel validated. Thank you." - Elinore W., Lancashire, UK "Thank you Phillip and Sam. Your work and passion is for the greater good of mankind. I am very grateful to you." - Kate Y., Northern Territory, Australia "At last, something is being done!" - Michaela G., Victoria, Australia "Thank you, thank you, thank you! It's nice to see and know someone is putting out the truth and waking humans up!! …and I can have it written…. thank you!" - Rochelle M., Victoria, Australia "It's about time we had an avenue to get the truth about health issues into our consciousness." - Glen S., Victoria, Australia "I have a degree in science, majoring in genetics. I have never practised what I have studied because I love nature just the way it is! Great to see this kind of organisation being formed as it makes me furious to learn of the health debacle that is going on in Australia and the rest of the westernised world! I have Fibromyalgia Syndrome and have had huge problems with doctors! I have now completely changed my diet and am doing lots of writing on the things that I am learning! I want to spread the word as much as I can to anyone who is willing to listen. My health and enthusiasm have improved because of what I have learned recently."- Nicola R., Victoria, Australia "I agree that too many people are slowly killing themselves as they are unaware or trust implicitly their doctor. It is hard to convince them to research other forms of looking after their own and their family's health." - Mrs Jill W., Western Australia, Australia "I work as a GP and am keen to pursue truthful medicine Thanks." Dr. Richard E., Western Australia, Australia "I have worked in the healthcare system for 20 years and have constantly found myself in the minority when questioning treatments, medications or diet. I look forward to receiving your bulletin and feel enriched not ostracized."- Mrs. Carolyn C., Victoria, Australia "I am so happy finally to have the information about health that I have intuitively known about all my life. I am 64 now and I am looking forward to at least another 40 years of optimum health. Thank you." - Ms Lindalee H., California, USA "I want to be reassured that the natural health products I am taking are effective. Hence joining the club to be updated with key issues in health." - Mrs M. C., Western Australia, Australia "I praise Phillip Day and the work of the CTM, because it is so important that the public is made aware of everything to do with health. I am only 17 and probably don't understand much but I know that I've changed my diet dramatically since reading Phillip Day's books. Well done." - Miss Talia G., South Australia, Australia "I have viewed the video of Phillip Day's "Healthy at 100" and am reading his book, "Cancer, Why We're Still Dying To Know The Truth", and I want to help spread the message. By keeping up with any current information, I will maintain a more accurate word to others." - Allan H., South Australia, Australia "Met Phillip at the Airport Hilton in Melbourne, Australia, then saw him again in Sydney at the Manly Warringah Leagues Club. We've read most of the wonderful books from Credence and love them all. The information has changed our lives dramatically. Thanks Phil." - Mr & Mrs Will K., New South Wales, Australia "I am a nurse/midwife. I resent having to give babies Hep. B and the other vaccines"- Ms Dolores H., Victoria, Australia "Phillip Day is the leading light in a sea of darkness that is the poisonous, government-funded international corporation." - Dominic M., Dublin, Ireland "As an embalmer, I have seen the effects of disease and how it takes lives that could have lived longer had they adhered to a few changes. I got involved with health care when I heard Dr Joel Wallach's tape 'Dead Doctors Don't Lie'. People should know the truth about our health care system and learn that we don't have to spend our senior years with cancer, diabetes, pain, Alzheimer's and many other debilitating diseases." - Victor A., Maine, USA "Having read 'Ten Minutes to Midnight', it would appear that you know the subject."- Ian M., Pembrokeshire, UK "We think yours is a good mission, as people should know the truth about how to get healed and to be able to do something for themselves." - Jenny Z., South Australia, Australia "Un-biased researched information that allows people to make informed decisions regarding their health and treatment can only be good. It's interesting to note that we see more and more people who are now querying orthodox treatment and wanting information for alternatives." - Liz M., Victoria, Australia "I work with pain and injury. I do Body Work. With only 15% of all clinical western medicine scientifically proven, your information is invaluable and life-saving. Keep up the great work and thank you!" - Taylor U., Victoria, Australia "Totally inspiring! It is great to hear that the truth is getting out. There is power in knowledge, power to change the world."- Maggie A., Te Awamutu, New Zealand "Felt strongly motivated by Phillip's talk. Have worked in pharmaceutical industry for 12 years. Lots of inside insight. No longer like what I do. Migrating toward the real education of the general public." - Stephen P., East Sussex, UK "I am inspired to change my diet and to spread
the information to people I know. Thank you" - Geok Kee S.,
Singapore "Very enlightening - it increased my already natural instincts of the use of drugs on people. I like the speech - British life, adjectives, jokes, humour. I guess I have to push myself to start somewhere to increase the nutrition in my family. Thanks." - Mrs M., Singapore "Super! Excellent! And thoroughly informative and the campaign MUST succeed" - Sandy K., Singapore "Being empowered by knowledge has really helped me overcome the fear of having breast cancer and helped me make my own decisions regarding my treatment - Thank you." - Mrs Annie C., Nelson, New Zealand Taking Your Medicine Many of us with chronic health problems rely on advocacy groups and peak medical bodies for independent advice and support. But just how independent is that advice and are we being given the full picture? The Age has found that many advocacy groups are becoming hooked on sponsorship dollars from drug companies and these international corporations are, in turn, using them to promote their products in Australia's booming $5 billion drug market. Asthma But Puff had an earlier existence. He began life as the registered trademark used by the pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline to market one if its asthma drugs, Seretide, to doctors. His colour matches the packaging for Seretide. It was GlaxoSmithKline's idea for the NAC to use its symbol and give Puff a new, much more public role encouraging asthmatics to update their medication regimens. GlaxoSmithKline, which is the world's biggest seller of asthma medications, also provided financial support for the television campaign to develop an interactive internet quiz for the NAC website to check whether someone's asthma was under control. Even if you answer, "No" to the initial question, "Do you have asthma" and say you have no symptoms, Puff advises you that your asthma appears to be under control, but you should visit your doctor anyway for a medical review. NAC chief executive Kristine Whorlow defends the use of a pharmaceutical logo to spearhead a supposedly independent campaign, saying market research before the campaign showed there was no public recognition of Puff. The board of the council, which is the peak asthma body in Australia, also discussed potential conflicts of interests. "When GSK was talking to us and we were talking to them about doing another consumer campaign and they came up with the idea of using Puff, we discussed that very thoroughly here at our board meetings and we decided to go ahead with it," she said. "But we only went ahead with it when we looked at the consumer research showing that the consumers were not aware of the dragon at all."…. It is not surprising that the NAC and GlaxoSmithKline should work so closely together on such a campaign. GlaxoSmith Kline was the founding sponsor of the council when it was launched more than a decade ago and remains its principal source of funds. According to the NAC's website, other sponsors in 2002 included the pharmaceutical companies AstraZeneca, Aventis, Boehringer Ingelheim,Schering-Plough, Merck, Novartis and Proctor and Gamble. According to MsWhorlow, up to 60 per cent of the council's annual budget of between $800,000 and $1 million comes from the pockets of pharmaceutical companies. Diabetes The sophisticated, multimedia campaign was run by Diabetes Australia's NSW division, but was paid for by O'Neill's sponsor, Capilano Honey, diabetes monitoring equipment maker, Abbott Laboratories, and AlphaPharm, which produces a range of generic diabetes drugs and claims to be "Australia's largest provider of oral anti-diabetic medication". AlphaPharm is a subsidiary of major international pharmaceutical company Merck, which also sells diabetes treatments. Although the sponsorships were not mentioned on the television commercial, which only displayed Diabetes Australia's logo, they were acknowledged on other campaign material. The campaign co-ordinator and corporate relations manager at Diabetes Australia - NSW, Bill Edmonds, says that AlphaPharm's "field force", or sales team, played a crucial role in the campaign's success. "Basically, they tour round the country and say, 'Look, here is the latest awareness campaign by Diabetes Australia, the 'Be Well - Know Your BGL campaign', and they hand it either to the practice nurse or the doctor. Now at the same time you know that the pharmaceutical company is also selling other products. (But) we couldn't afford to get it out there as effectively and efficiently as the 'field force'." Mr Edmonds says he does not believe that the arrangement could be misinterpreted as an endorsement by Diabetes Australia of AlphaPharm products "because doctors are pretty smart creatures". Part of Diabetes Australia's 12-member federation, the NSW division, is responsible for national marketing and fund raising and has attracted a long, varied list of corporate sponsors. Under the heading, "corporate sponsorship and branding opportunities", the NSW website boasts its campaigns provide "excellent return on investment" and says that the BGL campaign offers "unique branding and market expansion opportunities for all types of businesses". Mr Edmond says good publicity is the only benefit pharmaceutical sponsors such as AlphaPharm and Abbott get from their involvement, and that no sponsor has ever pressured him to get more for their money. But he admits he has "voluntarily "gone overboard" to thank the BGL campaign supporters, quoting them in press releases and even preparing a PowerPoint presentation for AlphaPharm sales staff this year about the effectiveness of the 2002 awareness campaign. This year, Edmonds says, only AlphaPharm, Merck and Novo Nordisk have supported the organisation, giving about $100,000, not including non-financial aid such as visiting doctors. In the past few years, Diabetes Australia has also won support from other diabetes drug producers, such as Aventis, Bayer, Eli Lilly, GlaxoSmithKline, Park Davis (now part of Pfizer), Roche and Servier. Compared with many consumer groups, Diabetes Australia and its NSW branch have massive budgets, around $93 million and $8 million respectively for the past year, although most of that money is tied up in administering the National Diabetes Services Scheme for the Federal Government. However, Diabetes Australia's executive director, Brian Conway, says that rather than avoiding any chance of conflicting interests, they choose to accept the funding and in-kind support because "it still helps". One such potential conflict of interest is when Diabetes Australia or its members lobby for diabetes drugs to be added to the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS). For two years, the organisation pressured the Government
to add Glaxo-produced Avandia and Actos, made by Eli Lilly, to the PBS
(they were finally listed in October this year). But Mr Conway denies
that both companies' past support for diabetes research and campaigns
helped win Diabetes Australia's Depression "DepressioNet would not exists today without Wyeth," Ms Pethick readily admits. "Wyeth is a company I am extremely proud to be associated with." Wyeth has provided $150,000 over the past three years to keep the Melbourne-based DepressionNet running. But the links do not stop there. Ms Pethick is also on the editorial board of Wyeth's own depression website, 'Yes To Life', and is a member of DepressioNet's medical advisory board. The Yes To Life links through DepressioNet, which is described as "an independent resource" without disclosing that it is substantially funded by Wyeth. Ms Pethick helps with training seminars for Wyeth's sales team and last year took part in a promotional tour the pharmaceutical company organised for a visiting US depression expert, Professor Martin Kellick. Ms Pethick even thanked Wyeth on her website for the opportunity to help with the national tour, which saw her costs paid by the company to take part in panel discussions at meeting of doctors. But what Wyeth did not tell Ms Pethick was that Professor Kellick had been at the centre of a row in his hometown of Boston in 1999, when The Boston Globe reported he failed to disclose more than $500,000 in consulting fees from pharmaceutical companies at conferences and in journal articles. "No, I wasn't aware of that," Ms Pethick told The Age. "On that particular tour no particular product was mentioned." DepressioNet's stated aim is to "significantly increase the proportion of Australian depression sufferers who seek help and treatment." Ms Pethick, who started the website in 2000 after her own battle with depression, agrees that encouraging more people to seek medical treatment will expand the market for antidepressants in Australia. But she sees no conflict of interest in accepting drug company sponsorship. She also insists her website, which also received a one-off grant of $20,000 from another pharmaceutical giant and the makers of Prozac, Eli Lilly, is able to remain independent. "The money we got from Wyeth was totally unconditional and helped us and continues to help us to provide a vital service," she said. "Any money we get, we disclose." When her own savings ran out in 2001, Ms Pethick deliberately approached companies in the antidepressant market because she thought they would be more interested in sponsorship. DepressioNet is not the only non-profit organisation advocating for patients with mental illness that receives pharmaceutical industry financial backing. The peak national body, Sane Australia, the operating name of the Schizophrenia Australia Foundation, relies on drug companies for about 25 per cent of its annual $1 million budget. Last year, Sane Australia used a grant from Novartis Pharmaceuticals, which markets two schizophrenia drugs, to commission an Access Economics report on the cost of schizophrenia to the community. The report found that many sufferers were missing out on treatment and said some newer medicines could be "extremely effective" in reducing symptoms. Earlier this year, Sane used a grant from GlaxoSmithKline, which markets a lithium-based drug for bipolar disorder, to commission a second Access Economics report, this time on the cost of bipolar disorder to the community. The report found that average treatment levels for sufferers was less than a quarter of what was considered best practice. Sane Australia's executive director, Barbara Hocking, said that the organisation accepted only unrestricted educational grants from pharmaceutical companies. "We receive grants for specific purposes. The purposes we receive them for are driven by us. We have our own guidelines," she said. Sane deliberately targeted Novartis and GlaxoSmithKline to fund the two Access Economics studies because they produced drugs in those markets. "The reality is, you go where you feel the money is likely to come from and it is precisely because those companies have products in that area that we felt they would be interested in having this independent information," Ms Hocking said. Arthritis "It was felt that in a small organisation that is a difficult thing to sustain," says association secretary, Associate Professor Geoff McColl. "There was some consideration that it may have limited the pool of individuals who might serve on the executive." Although the executive is mainly a professional body for rheumatologists, who specialise in diseases of the joints, muscles, and connective tissues, it also sees itself as a patient advocate. Instead of banning relationships with drug companies, the ARA now insists that its executive members put any conflict of interest on the record. But those disclosure documents are available only to other ARA members, rather than being open to public scrutiny. As well as sponsoring a number of the ARA's research and educational projects, each year, drug companies such as Pfizer, Schering-Plough. Wyeth, Abbott and Merck pay for its annual scientific meeting. Next year's conference is being held in Cairns. Dr McColl defends the drug-funded subsidy, saying some of his colleagues could struggle to attend if their costs shot up from around $600 to several thousand dollars. "We are grateful to our pharmaceutical colleagues, particularly as we believe, and I don't think there's any evidence to the contrary, that it doesn't alter our decision making," Dr McColl says. "Now, whether it has a more global effect on individuals' views of particular companies, that's a much more difficult thing to quantify." Just how easily patient Advocates can be swayed by relationships with drug companies was illustrated three years ago in a case involving Dr McColl and Arthritis Australia. In July 2000, The ABC's Media Watch exposed how a seemingly independent advertising campaign by the then Arthritis Foundation of Australia was used to sell the new arthritis treatment, Celebrex. The drug's co-marketers, Pfizers and Pharmacia, gave the Foundation an unconditional grant of $250,000. The money was spent on television and print ads telling people to "ask your doctor about exciting new arthritis treatments". Callers to the arthritis hot line were reportedly told, "there's this new whizzbang drug called Celebrex" and offered a phone number to find out more information. Former Arthritis Foundation director, Ian Hook, apologised, saying, "it won't happen again", but that didn't stop Celebrex quickly becoming one of the top selling drugs in Australia. At the time, Dr. McColl was on Pharmacia's medical advisory board and was one the reassuring public faces of the media and marketing blitz. He now regrets that involvement, saying he won't be part of another drug marketing campaign. "I think that taught us how powerful a direct-to-customer marketing campaign can be and I think really there should be some legislation or guidelines so that doesn't occur (again)," he says. "I've been made aware that if you work closely with these people your views can be subtly altered, and that that's fine as long as everyone knows that might have happened. And it's probably better, ideally, if you don't get involved." Dr McColl's relationship with the Pharmacia advisory board ended 18 months ago. He now advises Schering-Plough, makers of another rheumatoid arthritis treatment. All the key decision makers at Arthritis Australia who approved the Celebrex campaign have since left, and new president, Ita Buttrose, says she couldn't comment on why it went ahead. But she vows "As long as I am president, Arthritis Australia will not allow itself to be a disguised front for any pharmaceutical company or accept donations 'with strings attached' ". Herpes But there is something that visitors to the AHMF's website are not told: The group relies entirely on Australia's main herpes drug manufacturers for its existence, and has since it was set up in 1996. Recently appointed AHMF executive director, Trish Berger, estimates that in the past financial year, GlaxoSmithKline has given the AHMF about $120,000 or 80 per cent of its budget. The other 20 per cent comes from Novartis. There is a strong bond between the AHMF and GlaxoSmithKline, for many years the only major manufacturer of herpes treatment in Australia. Its constitution was written by Glaxo Wellcome's (now GlaxoSmithKline) Melbourne based law firm, Deacons, and up until August this year, the forum's administration was run by public relations firm, Edelman, hired on the recommendation of a well known client, GlaxoSmith Kline. Most of the experts who have sat on the AHMF board have also worked with or advised GlaxoSmith Kline and Novartis in recent years…. AHMF chairman, Professor Adrian Mindel concedes that the forum has been vulnerable to pressure from GlaxoSmith Kline and Novartis because without their funding, "the Australian Herpes Management Forum would cease to exist tomorrow"…. "We are all professionals who are mostly academics in this area, and protecting our own reputations and independence is also terribly important…We think it is a quid pro quo (arrangement) and that we gain some benefit from that by promoting the science and improving the general health of the community. They get the benefit in terms of their drug. And I'm not sure it's possible to completely separate the two." In contrast, Professor Mindel says the global version of the AHMF, the International Herpes Management Forum, may be a different story. He says that although the IHMF "produces some high quality material……whether it is completely unbiased is questionable because of its close ties to dug companies." More than half of the current IHMF board have links to GlaxoSmithKline, such as leading trials of its herpes drugs, or, in one case, featuring in a Glaxo sponsored television special. Novartis has since signed on as a sponsor too, and the companies influence the International Herpes Alliance (which also relied on GSK funding to get started in 1999) website. Its "educational" material for journalists has been written by the "organisations (that) have made educational contributions to the International Herpes Alliance for the promotion of herpes awareness" - in other words, GlaxoSmithKline and Novartis. COPD The experts were members of the executive committee of an organisation called Global Initiative for Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease, or GOLD. The organisation was sponsored entirely by the pharmaceutical companies attending the meeting and the airfares and the hotel expenses for the medical experts had been provided. Minutes from the meeting showed that "the committee and sponsors discussed the development of a World COPD Day and suggested that the feasibility and objectives… be discussed." Nine months later, World COPD Day was launched using promotional materials prepared by GOLD with the aim of raising public awareness of the threat posed by chronic lung diseases. In Australia this was spearheaded by the Australian Lung Foundation, the consumer and research arm of the Thoracic Society of Australia and New Zealand. No mention was made that the pharmaceutical companies providing the money to run GOLD were also some of the biggest players in the global respiratory medicines market, including the world leader, GlaxoSmithKline. Nor was it obvious that the Australian Lung Foundation's launch was also partly funded by GlaxoSmithKline and another international heavyweight, Boehringer Ingelheim. And even harder to pick was, that the company that runs GOLD was an American Communications corporation that boasts, on its website, of helping the pharmaceutical industry "find solutions to significant marketing and education challenges" through such techniques as promoting brands and repositioning or launching products. Dr Larry Grouse, the chief executive of the company Medical Communications Resources Inc, is also the co-ordinator of GOLD and listed as a member of its executive committee. "No, I wasn't actually aware of that. Thanks for pointing it out," says William Darbishire, the chief executive of the Australian Lung Foundation, which is setting up a national call centre to provide advice to COPD sufferers with a $US 20,000 ($A 27,000) grant from drug giant Pfizer. MCR and virtually the same set of sponsors are also behind an international organisation called Global Initiative For Asthma, or GINA. Dr Christine Jenkins is an independent Australian representative on Gold's executive committee as well as being the head of clinical trials at Sydney University's Woolcock Institute of Medical Research which received a $1million endowment from GlaxoSmithKline. She strongly rejects any suggestion that the pharmaceutical industry sponsors of GOLD and GINA could influence the setting of guidelines for the types of drugs doctors are advised to use to treat asthma or chronic lung disease. "I think Gold is a very, very independent process," says Dr Jenkins, who helped to launch Australia's first COPD Day at a Lung Foundation media conference last year. When GOLD issued updated treatment guidelines in July, the medication, tiotropium, marketed by Boehringer and Pfizer as Spiriva, was added to the list recommended. The companies issued a media release quoting Dr. Larry Grouse, but failed to mention their financial support. Five months earlier, when Spiriva was launched on to the Australian market, Pfizer and Boehringer issued a local media release through public relations company Hill and Knowlton quoting Dr Jenkins on the dangers of COPD. Dr Jenkins said tiotropium was "an excellent drug" and it should be expected that pharmaceutical companies would use such decisions to market their products. "I think the companies will use GOLD, there is no question," said Dr Jenkins, who has her air fares and accommodation paid for by GOLD's drug company's sponsors when she attends executive meetings. "That's their business, to sell dugs." Further Resources To purchase or for more information: www.credence.org
Mobile Health Alert Parents will today be told to curb the amount of call time their children spend on mobile phones. The warning comes on the back of Government research into the health impact of the devices. Several recent studies have highlighted potential risks including that of developing tumours. But the scientists at the National Radiological Protection Board, a Government watchdog, say the evidence is inconclusive. A source close to the board's investigation - details of which will be unveiled today - says it will advise all mobile phone users to adopt a 'precautionary principle'. Experts are especially concerned by high mobile usage among youngsters. Around a quarter of the 47 million people with handsets in Britain are under 18. The latest review will confirm that, in the few studies so far conducted on mobile phone use and cancer risk, no link has been found. It will, however, point to Scandinavian research that suggests a higher risk of developing brain tumours. The Swedish experts found that users of analogue mobile phones, which are now obsolete, were at 3.5 times the risk of developing a benign tumour. A Finnish study, meanwhile, showed a doubling of the
risk of brain tumours after two years of mobile phone use. The NRPB source
added: "There's still nothing definite on the cancer issue. The
problem is that no one is ever going to be able to say that mobile phones
and masts are absolutely safe." Further Resources Vitamin D Supplement 'Halves the Risks of MS' Women who take vitamin D as a food supplement have their risk of developing multiple sclerosis cut by nearly half compared with women who take no supplements, researchers said yesterday. The study from America lends weight to other research into the "sunshine vitamin" and MS. This has suggested that people living closer to the equator are at less risk compared to those living at higher latitudes. Kassandra Munger, of Harvard School of Public Health, said in the journal of the American Academy of Neurology that women who took high levels of vitamin D from food and from a vitamin pill had a reduced risk. She found that vitamin D derived from food alone did not have the same effect. The analysis of details of nearly 180,000 women detected 173 cases of MS over 20 years. Women who took more than 400 IU (international units) a day in the form of multi-vitamin supplements had their risk reduced by 40 per cent. "These results need to be confirmed with additional research but it's exciting to think that something as simple as taking a multi-vitamin could reduce your risk of developing MS," Miss Munger said. She added that as the vitamin D was taken in a multi-vitamin tablet it was hard to isolate the effects of vitamin D from the potential benefit of other vitamins. Last summer the British Medical Journal reported that
higher exposure to sunshine - which creates vitamin D in the body - reduced
the risk of MS. It is said that children aged six to 15 would need up
to three hours of sun a day during the summer to benefit.
Profile The disease is almost always restricted to young and middle-aged adults, with an approximate 60%/40% spread across females and males respectively. The geographical spread of incidence is also quite telling with MS, with the disease more prevalent in northern latitudes, with 50-100 cases per 100,000, compared with 5-10 per 100,000 in the tropics. The exception to this spread is Japan, where the disease is rare. The Faeroe Islands (between Britain and Norway) had never experienced any signs of multiple sclerosis until the British Army landed there during World War 2 with all its supplies to set up a garrison. Symptoms MS symptoms vary in intensity and duration, depending on which of the many different manifestations of the disease the patient has. Causes If we review the following key factors about MS, we can begin to build a profile of who's at risk… and where: · The disease mostly occurs in young to middle-aged
adults From this short summary, we may surmise that: Commentary Molecular Mimicry Problems with the immune system will occur when healthy proteins existing in a person's body (i.e. myelin basic protein) correspond very closely to trouble-making proteins that make up bacteria, fungi, yeasts, etc. One MS site explains the proposed mechanism this way: "To understand how molecular mimicry works in the induction of autoimmunity, one must understand the basic mechanisms of an immune response to a foreign invader in the body. The immune system recognises a part of the protein portion of the invader. It does this with T cells which have receptors which bind to short segments (up to 10 amino acids) of a foreign protein. It is helped in this task by so-called antigen presenting cells such as macrophages. A macrophage will engulf a foreign invader (e.g. a bacteria or food particle) and break it down into fragments. A special molecule in the macrophage then carries a protein fragment (peptide) to the surface of the cell and 'presents' it to the millions of circulating T cells. A T cell which has a matching receptor locks onto the presented protein fragment. The T cell then becomes activated and stimulates other portions of the immune system to begin an immune response against all proteins which contain a similar-looking amino acid string. The details of what constitutes a similar-looking string are beyond this summary, but suffice to say it has been found that a variety of similar, yet somewhat different strings, can be recognised by the same T cell." Dr Roy Swank Also up for discussion is whether the chicken comes before the egg. Do food intolerances cause MS, or are food intolerances the result of an MS-compromised immune system? Do fungi provoke the immune system into destroying not only the fungi, but healthy myelin cells also, which may have a similar amino acid signature to the fungi? Medicine uses immune-suppressing drugs in the belief that MS is the result of a dysfunctional immune system and therefore, by reducing the effectiveness of the immune system, one may retard the spread of the illness. This is what I term a 'scorched earth' policy, where the only cunning plan you have come up with to halt the advance of the enemy is to burn and destroy all the land in the path of his advance in the hope that you will starve him into submission. Not such a great strategy, in my humble opinion. Critters Gerald Green is a herbalist who lives in Sussex, England. His grandfather was Nobel laureate Professor Fritz Huber, a leading German scientist who died in the mid-1930's. An elderly gentleman experienced in healthcare, Gerald submitted some of his MS case histories to me, with the permission of his patients, which showed the benefits of an anti-Candida regimen, along with sensible supplementation and changes in lifestyle. Gerald Green works on the premise that ALL MS patients have a microbe problem, and that it is pointless trying to combat the disease unless you addressed the underlying causes first. He suggests patients adopt his strict anti-Candida diet. This diet, I had found, was cropping up in various permutations in highly successful cancer treatments all over the world, from the Gerson Therapy pioneered by the famous Dr Max G, through to clinics in Mexico and the UK across to physicians prescribing it in one form or another to their patients as far away as the Philippines and New Zealand. The diet itself may also explain why Japan escapes the full brunt of MS, unlike other industrialised nations of comparable latitude. Many Japanese citizens still adhere to their national, alkalising diet of rice, vegetables and lots of fish, although, it must be said, the fast-food monster has now taken its grim hold on those islands, with unfortunate, if predictable consequences for the future. It is my conclusion that fungi are suspected of playing the key, primary role in this disease and may well contain the amino acid chains mimicked, in which case the immune system may be correctly attacking fungal infestation while its attack template is also destroying healthy cells in the body - in this case, myelin sheathing cells intrinsic to the successful operation of the central nervous system. Clearly not everyone, who has overgrowths of yeasts/fungi/ parasites, is getting MS. The disease in my view must have a certain number of factors working synergistically to bring on the problem. The following may be such a profile: · A western, industrialised diet rich in refined,
processed sugars and grains - aspartame may be an implicator Take action · DIET: COMMENCE THE ANTI-CANDIDA DIETARY
REGIMEN, ensuring that the Foods to avoid and supplementation are
rigorously adhered to © Copyright 2004 Phillip Day Further Resources: To purchase or for more information: www.credence.org CALLING ALL VOTERS: Dear All, PHILLIP DAY's COMMENT: You don't have to live in the above area to vote! It takes seconds to vote NO! so click on the link! Further Resources: To purchase or for more information: www.credence.org Customers Show Yellow Card In November, Parliament gave power to strategic health authorities (SHAs) to order water companies to add fluoridation chemicals to the public drinking water supplies after public consultations. The water companies want civil and criminal indemnity if they are forced to fluoridate. Last week, the National Pure Water Association's 43-year fight against artificial water fluoridation took a new turn. "We have been inundated with calls from very angry people all over the UK who consider fluoridation to be mass medication without their consent, with untested, unlicensed chemicals," said Jane Jones, Campaign Director of the NPWA. "The companies are trying to raise billions of pounds for new infrastructure and say that customers' bills will rise by about 30% over the next few years. If water fluoridation goes ahead, people will not hesitate to deduct money from their water bills." "Many people are threatening to stop paying their water bills all together if fluoridation goes ahead. We cannot support that, but we do feel that customers would have a genuine grievance and would therefore be entitled to take action to protect their health and their rights. The water companies know that fluoridation contravenes several Human Rights Conventions and Acts. That's why they asked for civil and criminal indemnity if they are forced to fluoridate." In 1995, Yorkshire Water issued a press statement saying that they would not fluoridate because their customers did not want it and because Government indemnities to them were "insufficient." On Saturday, volunteers from the NPWA, the Green Party and Friends of the Earth were joined by other groups from across Yorkshire and Lancashire to launch a postcard campaign on Yorkshire Water and United Utilities. The campaign goes national this week. Peter Crampton of West Yorkshire Campaign Against Fluoridation, said: "People are not prepared to allow unelected health authorities to override their human rights. Several MPs complained that SHAs had urged them to vote for fluoridation. Clearly the public can have no trust in these quangos to undertake impartial consultations. In any case, 'the public' has no authority to remove the right of any individual to refuse medication. That's why this action is aimed directly at the water companies." "Elected Councils have a duty to protect the public," said Cllr Liz Vaughan of North West Councils Against Fluoridation. "To medicate people without their individual consent is a serious violation of human rights legislation. We want an assurance from water companies that they will not fluoridate. If they do, people will protect the rights and health of their families by deducting the costs of home water treatment equipment (between and ) from their water bills. Alternatively, they will charge the water companies for bottled water. The new Water Act is illegal because violates every individual's right to refuse medication or treatment for non-contagious diseases," said Dr Spencer Fitzgibbon of The Green Party. Jenny Jones, Green Deputy Mayor of London agrees. "This is a yellow card for the water companies. Their customers are not at all happy and I entirely agree with them. Water fluoridation is mass medication." "The National Register of Objectors to Water
Fluoridation has topped half a million and more people sign up every day,"
said Jane Jones. PHILLIP DAY'S COMMENT: The proposed mandatory polluting of our drinking supplies with raw industrial waste out of the phosphate fertiliser industry is the subject of on-going CTM campaigning. If you are in Britain, ensure that you join Jane Jones' excellent organisation at the above web-link. For the global site, see www.fluoridealert.org Further Resources To purchase or for more information: www.credence.org Up Front and Personal ECLUB: Hey ho. Further Resources
Vultures over Europe In 1901, Britain's Queen Victoria dies. For many, the passing of Britain's longest-living monarch symbolises the ending of an age. Many have known no different, millions having lived and died during the period of her monumental reign. A definite and significant passing is sensed by all - even an end it seems to the visible, moral austerity of the Victorian Era. The sobriety that characterises her magnificent funeral and the period of her mourning eventually passes, and the peoples around the world, raised under her sceptre, begin gathering themselves to contemplate their future. Inventions, railways, the first airplanes, communications, electric street lamps and the advent of a new century promise the birth of a more alluring future - a bright, sophisticated new modern age of materialism, presided over by Victoria's son, the womaniser and profligate, King Edward VII. People relax and begin to have fun. Britain's power is at its zenith. The sun never sets on the British Empire. Merchants bring their goods to the West from the marvellous and exotic lands of Kipling. Excitement fires a million imaginations. Many sense the dawn of a New Age. The possibilities seem endless. And the soft but determined breeze of change caresses the cheeks of those whose faces are turned expectantly, searching towards the horizon of their future. PROMOTING HATE "In 1850, psychiatrist C T Groddeck was awarded a doctorate for his dissertation entitled "The Democratic Disease - A New Form of Insanity". In Groddeck's view, every democratically inclined person was insane. In 1854 his colleague, C J Wretholm, 'discovered' the 'Sermon Disease'. Psychiatrist P J Möbius lectured shortly thereafter on the 'psychological feeble-mindedness of the woman'. Not long thereafter, the leading proponents of psychiatry in Germany were advocating the theory that anyone who refused military service for religious reasons was abnormal and 'sick'. A psychiatrist named Adolf Hoppe characterised conscientious objection to military service as an 'unmistakable expression of ethnic inferiority'. One of psychiatry's leading figures, Richard von Krafft-Ebing, added to his list of varieties of mental disorders 'political and reformatory insanity' - meaning any inclination to form a different opinion from that of the masses. An excellent tool was thus created for politicians to denounce opponents. With the help of psychiatric classifications, it was now possible to perform the character assassination of a political enemy in the wink of an eye - anyone who disagreed was obviously insane." By 1871, the trend is in full-swing. Psychiatrist Carl Stark publishes a treatise entitled "The Psychical Degeneration of the French People", in which he presents the concept that the French have degenerated into mass-delusion, warmongering and delirium. Now, with being French a mental illness, others come forward. Löwenfeld discusses 'the national character of the French and its sickly excesses': "The kind of mental abnormalities emerging nowadays belong to a borderline area which I label as psychopathy, psychopathic inferiorities, psychopathic conditions, and so on. I believe therefore that it is justified now to talk about a 'psychopathia gallica', which should by now be obvious." Psychiatry is soon seen adopting the paradox of glorifying war and xenophobia while at the same time denouncing pacifism and tolerance of minorities. The warmongering pronouncements of Nietzsche, Houston Stewart Chamberlain, Joseph-Arthur, Comte de Gobineau and others of their persuasion have, by the first decade of the 1900's, taken firm root and primed Europe for war. The Illuminati cryptocracy and its banks, championed by the Rothschild dynasty, are forever courting powerful leaders. They have not been idle in their efforts to subvert nationalism, denigrate and dismantle national sovereignty, corrupt the money supply with their inflatable paper notes of debt (paper currency), and plant in the minds of many the desirability to move towards a world order. Europe has become a patchwork of national treaties which compel countries to go to the aid of their treaty partners in the event that war is declared upon the partner. All that is needed is a spark. INTO THE BREACH The subsequent deaths of the Archduke and his wife set into motion the now famous catastrophic treaty landslide. On 27th July, Austria severs diplomatic ties with Serbia. The following day, spurred on by Austro-Hungarian public outrage over the shooting of Ferdinand by 'a degenerate', Austria declares war on Serbia. The Russians react by mobilising to the aid of their treaty partner, Serbia. Austria reacts by calling in its treaty partner, Germany. On 2nd August, Berlin demands passage for its troops through Belgium. On 3rd August, Germany declares war on 'degenerate' France. On 4th August, Britain comes to the aid of its treaty partner, France, and declares war on Germany. On 5th August, Austria declares war on Russia. World War 1 has begun. The outbreak of hostilities on a scale hitherto unseen
introduces Nietzsche's long-awaited Aryan war. That this is a glorious
thing is regularly expounded upon in the almost unbelievable psychiatric
literature of the day. Yet not even after the Dantéan phenomenon
of millions dead and 20 million wounded will psychiatry be repentant of
the role it played. By way of illustrating psychiatry's surviving, racist
ethos following World War 1 and the implications of this for psychiatry's
involvement in another future war, witness Dr Johannes Bresler, editor-in-chief
of the Psychiatrisch-Neurologische Wochenzeitschrift (Psychiatric Neurological
Weekly), who later in 1926 ominously remarks: 'WAR NEUROSES' Both sides fire millions of artillery rounds before the actual infantry advances begin. Over half a million men are lost during the ten months of battle which follow. First the Germans advance and then the French, driving back the Germans with the help of the British, who open up a major action on the River Somme. During the four-month Battle of the Somme alone, the repeated, atrocious engagements with artillery and machine guns claim the lives of 600,000 Allied troops, two-thirds of them British. German losses are estimated at 450,000. All day long, soldiers are ordered out of their trenches into the vulnerable line of sight of enemy machine guns and slaughtered. Many of the soldiers have their hearing blown out by the unbelievable detonations of the apocalyptic artillery barrages preceding the attacks, and are incapable of hearing orders above the din. Significantly, psychiatry introduces the new concept of 'war neurotics' to the world as unprecedented numbers of soldiers experience fits of quivering, crying, hysteria and vomiting. Widespread desertions from frontline units alarm the German authorities of the day, ever promoting the 'glorious war' ethic and the struggle for 'Teutonic supremacy'. The unsettling, un-German problem of the 'war neurotic' is quickly passed to the psychiatrists. The aim is to render these soldiers fit for active duty again as quickly as possible. Drastic remedies are showcased, such as electroshock therapy, which sometimes has the desired effect of galvanising 'slackers' back to the front even before treatment, due to its appalling effects and rapidly spreading sinister reputation. Hamburg-based psychiatrist Dr Max Nonne recalls: "The war brought us in Eppendorf a tremendous workload. We soon got to see sad pictures of men who were amputated, half-paralysed through head wounds, paralysed down to the legs, the bladder and the rectum because of bullets in the spine, of epileptics who had seizures because of head wounds. But after a few months, we saw a sight we had rarely seen before - the sight of hysteria virilis, the 'manly hysteria', which had once been described to us by Charcot in Paris. We had said then: 'This only happens to the French. In Germany, hysteria of the men does not exist.' But now we saw it often and in all forms: as paralysis of the vocal cords, as dumbness, as paralysis of the upper and lower extremities, as trembling in all parts of the body, as spasms of single muscles and muscle groups, as deafness, as inabilities to see and walk, and as dislocations in the most confounded forms." LESS THAN MANLY "Sometimes in place of war neurosis, German psychiatrists used terms like 'traumatic neurosis', 'fright neurosis', 'grenade shock' or 'war hysteria'. In other countries, such as Britain, this hysteria was described as 'shell shock', 'concussion neurosis', 'gas neurosis' or 'battle fatigue'. However in 1915, the German army medical services forbade the use of the word 'hysteria' in military psychiatric diagnosis because it was contrary to the noble concept of honour befitting a warrior. In the eyes of the army, the diagnosis of a hysterical reaction was dishonourable and, therefore, banned. No doubt the German army was offended in part by the suggestion that its soldiers might be less than 'manly'. After all, 'hysteria' comes from the Greek 'hyster', meaning 'uterus', and connotes a woman's suffering, not the illness of a soldier." Denying that soldiers are in any way 'sick' and therefore exempt from combat, German war authorities are able to use psychiatry as a justification for denying the symptoms that are cropping up in medical offices such as Dr Nonne's. Front-line commanders are expressly forbidden from sending the 'tremblers' and 'hystericals' away from the fighting. 'Kaufmann Therapy' awaits those who shirk battle and 'feign symptoms'. This controversial approach follows the line that war neurosis is a 'constitutional, psychopathic inferiority', and those suffering from it are plainly too weak to endure the beauty of the war. Those undergoing the therapy are prepared with pre-shock suggestions. Then a strong alternating current is passed through the patient's head while the therapist repeats strong military commands in the form of 'psychic driving'. The patient is under the strict enforcement that he must be healed in one session. At the annual conference of the Gesellschaft Deutscher Nervenärzte in Bonn on 29th September 1917, Dr M Raether, head doctor of the Provinzial Heil und Pflegeinstitut, includes a demonstration of 'Kaufmann Cure' in his lecture. Even in the eyes of the most forward-thinking psychiatrists of the day, the concept of treating shell shock with electric shock is radical and uncomfortably close to plain, old-fashioned torture. With no scientific evidence at all to back up the supposed efficacy of his treatments, Kaufmann and his followers are nevertheless allowed to continue, disciplining 'malingerers' with high voltage, hauling them back to the front, thereby cementing up embarrassing breaches in the honour and nobility of German military service. An electric shock box was also available near the front for use by psychiatrists to kill their own soldiers. Dr Emil Gelny, later a Nazi Party member from 1933, founded electro-execution: "Once a patient went unconscious from the effects of the electricity, the caretakers then had to attach four other electrodes to the hands and feet of the patient. Dr Gelny ran high voltage through them and after ten minutes at the most, the death of the patient would set in." In spite of psychiatric measures like Kaufmann's being couched in pseudo-scientific terminology, and attempting to pass themselves off as 'cutting-edge medicine', there are those in the scientific community of the day who see their psychiatric colleagues "…sinking back into the barbarism of the Middle Ages." Röder et al report that psychiatry predictably had an ingenious answer to its attackers at this time: "It took considerable courage to denounce the psychiatric movement of the era because critics were liable to be labelled with an unfavourable diagnosis by the very subjects of their criticism. This was no idle fear. In 1927, a professor of psychiatry from Hamburg named Ernst Ritterhaus actually came up with the diagnosis of 'mass psychosis of hostility toward psychiatry' for all critics of the psychiatric movement. In other words, 'if you disagree with us or challenge our methods, you are insane.' The same diagnosis was applied to a large number of journalists, doctors, officers, legislators, manufacturers and law professors as well as the victims of psychiatry who had dared to challenge the utility and ethics of inhuman therapies. By then, it was almost impossible to argue logically against psychiatry - psychiatry was too irrational to allow for it." In his extraordinarily arrogant declaration in 1899, leading psychiatrist P J Möbius had elevated psychiatry to the post of 'Judge of all Human Things', a position still occupied at that time in the minds of most by God Himself: "The psychiatrist should be the judge about mental health, because only he knows what 'ill' means. If one views psychiatry in this way, then it turns from a servant into a ruler, and becomes what by nature it should be. The psychiatrist then becomes the judge of all human things, a teacher of the lawyer and theologian, a leader of the historian and the writer." Plainly, even by the turn of the 20th century, German psychiatry already saw itself poised to influence the legislature, the media, religion and even history itself in its grandiose designs for control. The tools to enforce this control were by this time already nearing completion: "The formula was as simple as it was chilling
in its implications. Beneath a shroud of a few impressive-sounding, Greek-
and Latin-based words, and cloaked with the presumed authority of a medical
science, to shut up your critic, simply pronounce him or her insane and
do so from the point of view of the omniscient expert." 'LIFE UNWORTHY OF LIVING' Many try to process the horrors of the Second World War without an understanding of the framework behind why the atrocities happened. Many times we read of the grotesque incongruity of the Nazi officer - a cultured and | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||