We Need to Move on From Self-Care to Something Outside of Capitalism
From The Guardian: Rather than just seeing ourselves, we need to recognise that our health and fates are inextricably linked to our fellow human beings and find collective care.
National Survey: Students’ Feelings About High School Are Mostly Negative
From Yale News: Ask a high school student how he or she typically feels at school, and the answer you’ll likely hear is “tired,” closely followed by “stressed” and “bored.”
Schools Are Surveiling Student Emails for Suicide Risks, Raising ACLU Concerns
From The Detroit News: Roughly 1,400 districts across the U.S. have hired Gaggle to use artificial intelligence and staff to search nearly 4 billion emails and school-email based documents last year.
System for Mental Health Diagnosis Is Corrupt, Some Experts Say
From Psychology Today: Our lives are bound into complexly interwoven ecologies of relationship, experience and meaning that evade compartmentalization.
Obituary: Bonnie Burstow, Psychotherapist Who Rejected Psychiatry
From The New York Times: "I always saw the world as having two negative responses to people they aren’t happy with... That is either 'They are bad,' or 'They are sick.'"
Number of ER Visits for Suicidal Thoughts, Self-Harm Keeps Rising
From U.S. News & World Report: "It's the only major cause of death that we don't aggressively fund research for," Foreman said. Also, there are no standards for care, and little or no training is given in medical school. "We're not acting like we care."
Cops Are Illegally Detaining and Hurting Mental Health Patients
From VICE: Understaffed hospitals in Vermont are engaging local law enforcement as security, but their lack of training means people get hurt, citations are issued, and already-strained regions lose access to healthcare.
Doctors Prescribe More of a Drug If They Receive Money from a Related Pharma...
From ProPublica: On average, across all drugs, providers who received payments specifically tied to a drug prescribed it 58% more than providers who did not receive payments.
The Disturbing Rise in Benzodiazepine Prescriptions
From Psychology Today: For every 100 adults nationwide who saw a doctor from 2014-16, 27 left with a prescription for the psychiatric drug.
Waterboarding of Detainees Was So Gruesome, Even CIA Officials Wept
From the Los Angeles Times: "It is one thing that [Mitchell and Jessen] are utterly unapologetic; that is a commentary on them. But it is something else altogether that so much of the rest of the country is utterly indifferent; that is a commentary on us."
I Was Tortured for Days Thanks to Jessen and Mitchell. A “Sorry” Would Be...
From Newsweek: The past cannot be undone but we can try to build a better future. As a start, I would like the two men to stop by my cell this week. I am still waiting for an apology.
Architect of C.I.A. Interrogation Program Testifies at Guantánamo Bay
From The New York Times: Dr. James Mitchell, a former contract psychologist for the C.I.A., expressed no regrets or contrition, tearfully saying he did it for the American people and would "get up today and do it again."
The Psychological Impacts of Poverty, Digested
From BPS Research Digest: "Kids from lower socioeconomic levels show brain physiology patterns similar to someone who actually had had damage in the frontal lobe as an adult."
5 Things to Know as Calif. Starts Screening Children for Toxic Stress
From California Healthline: Starting this year, routine pediatric visits for millions of California children could involve questions about touchy family topics, such as divorce, unstable housing or a parent who struggles with alcoholism.
FDA Approves Drugs Faster Than Ever but Relies on Weaker Evidence
From NPR: Almost half of recent new drug approvals were based on only one pivotal clinical trial instead of the two or more that used to be the norm.
The 3rd Annual Shkreli Awards: Dishonorable Mentions in Health Care
From the Lown Institute: The Lown Institute's top ten list of the worst examples of profiteering and dysfunction in health care, named for Martin Shkreli, the price-hiking "pharma bro" that everyone loves to hate.
Lawsuit Over Teen’s Diagnosis, Treatment Heads to Trial
From AP: The suit was brought against Boston Children's Hospital by the parents of Justina Pelletier, who in 2013 was placed into state custody after a dispute over her diagnosis and put in a psychiatric unit.
Ecopsychology: How Immersion in Nature Benefits Your Health
From Yale Environment 360: A recent study found that people who spent two hours a week in green spaces were substantially more likely to report good health and psychological well-being than those who don't.
Veteran Saves Lives With Story of Polypharmacy, Overmedication
From KSFR Santa Fe Public Radio: Former Sergeant Angela Peacock has found a new mission in life: To help all who suffer from post-traumatic stress and give voice to an invisible population and another experience that can kill.
More Americans Are Killing Themselves at Work
From The Washington Post: The number of such suicides for 2018 was 304 — an 11 percent increase from the year before and the highest number since the BLS began tracking the data 26 years ago.
The Medications That Change Who We Are
From BBC Future: We’re all familiar with the mind-bending properties of psychedelic drugs, but it turns out ordinary medications – from paracetamol (acetaminophen) to antihistamines, statins, asthma medications and antidepressants – can be just as potent.
Study: Increasing Min. Wage by $1 Could Reduce US Suicide Rates
From CNN: A new 25-year observational study also found that a $2 increase could have prevented an estimated 40,000 suicides alone between 2009 and 2015.
The Disturbing Prevalence of NYPD Taser Use on ‘Mentally Ill’ New Yorkers
From Filter: 911 calls involving a person in crisis have nearly doubled in the last decade, but only 21 percent of patrol officers had received crisis intervention training as of January 2017.
After Half My Life on Antidepressants, I’m Off the Meds and Feel All Right
From The Washington Post: I believed that my only choices were to cope with depression or cope with antidepressants, and that depression would always thump inside me with the regularity of my own pulse.
Elizabeth Wurtzel, Author of ‘Prozac Nation,’ Has Died at 52
From CNN: Her 1994 memoir stood as a cultural standard against which future conversations about antidepressants and mental health would be measured.
