Robert Hawkins, Omaha Shooter, Another Failed Experiment with Antidepressant drugs

In 2005, I reported on this site that Eli Lilly had full knowledge of a 1200% increase in suicide risk for takers of their Prozac drug, a popular anti-depressant SSRI medication. (See http://www.newstarget.com/003086.html )

In 2006, we reported the results of a study published in the Archives of General Psychiatry showing that teens taking antidepressant drugs are more likely to commit suicide (and to be "successful" at completing the act). See http://www.newstarget.com/020643.html

On September 11, 2006, I reported on the link between antidepressant drugs and violent behavior yet again. (See http://www.newstarget.com/020394.html ) In that article, I explained, "If you're going to alter the brain chemistry of these children, you had better be prepared for the results. The result we're seeing now is mass killings. Elsewhere around the world, where children aren't doped up on all these drugs, we don't see this kind of behavior. This is what happens when you change children's brain chemistry; you get these results..."

The very next day, we published a report about the anti-depressant drug Paxil doubling the risk of violent behavior. (See http://www.newstarget.com/020406.html ) In that article, I stated, "This finding helps explain why school shootings are almost always conducted by children who are taking antidepressants. We also know that SSRIs cause children to disconnect from reality. When you combine that with a propensity for violence, you create a dangerous recipe for school shootings and other adolescent violence.

In April of this year, I also reported on the link between antidepressant drugs and the Virginia Tech shooting. See http://www.newstarget.com/021798.html

What I said in that article has urgent application right now, following the Omaha shooting:

A study published in the Public Library of Science Medicine (an open source medical journal) explored these same links in detail. (See Antidepressants and Violence: Problems at the Interface of Medicine and Law, by David Healy, Andrew Herxheimer, David B. Menkes)

The authors note that "Some regulators, such as the Canadian regulators, have also referred to risks of treatment-induced activation leading to both self-harm and harm to others" and the "United States labels for all antidepressants as of August 2004 note that 'anxiety, agitation, panic attacks, insomnia, irritability, hostility, aggressiveness, impulsivity, akathisia (psychomotor restlessness), hypomania, and mania have been reported in adult and pediatric patients being treated with antidepressants for major depressive disorder as well as for other indications, both psychiatric and nonpsychiatric'".

In other words, the link between antidepressants and violence has been known for years by the very people manufacturing, marketing or prescribing the drugs. As the author of the study mentioned above concluded, "The new issues highlighted by these cases need urgent examination jointly by jurists and psychiatrists in all countries where antidepressants are widely used."