Reviewed by Fritz;

Breggin, Peter R. The Anti-Depressant Fact Book: What Your Doctor Wont Tell You About Prozac, Zoloft, Paxil, Celexa, and Luvox. Cambridge, MA: DaCapo, 2001.

Peter Breggin, a psychiatrist who has devoted much of his career to challenging the psychiatric drug industry, has created a very user friendly and informative guide to the concealed truth about the widely popular class of psychiatric drugs known as “antidepressants”.

This is a relatively slim volume, but it still manages to cover all the bases, using a thoroughly convincing combination of medical studies, court cases, and personal anecdotes to cover everything from the non-disease nature of what has been labeled “depression”, to the brain damage caused by antidepressants, including detailed information about the function of the Serotonin system. Many examples are given of drug “side effects” which harm the body and mind, potentially inducing “mental illness” and leading to psychosis, suicide and violence. The addictive nature of antidepressants is acknowledged, including common withdrawal problems, and the particular danger of giving these drugs to children is stressed. Although this book is focused on antidepressants, Breggin also takes the time to connect the facts about antidepressants to the bigger picture of the corruption of the entire psychiatric industry, and the danger of all of it’s drugs. Someone who reads this book will likely seek out some of Breggin's other works, and see their opinions about the psychiatric system drastically changed.

Because this book was published before the 2004 decision by the FDA to put a blackbox warning on antidepressants, resulting in a subsequent drop in prescriptions to adolescents, this book has become slightly outdated, though the information it contains is all still valid. Unlike some lesser known critics of the psychiatric system who may be affiliated with religious groups, alternative medicine, or other potentially biased philosophies in competition with the psychiatric system, Breggin’s arguments are firmly rooted in objective fact. The arguments he presents are coherent, they don’t contradict themselves, and they are thoroughly backed up by sources such as medical studies and legal documents, including many examples of suppressed information which have never before been available to the public.

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For more great anti-psychiatry perspectives, from this author and others, check out our evolving resource; http://www.againstpsychiatry.com