Would you like a little Prozac or Zoloft with your water???

A Decade Later Additional Heightened Concerns About Pharmaceuticals inWater

An absolutely EXCELLENT article on this issue!!!! This kind of concern was first raised a decade ago in 2000. We sent out the information far and wide then. Clearly few knew enough to be concerned. But now with further study the results are shockingly confirming all we warned of in 2000! Those results are especially telling when it comes to fish being given low doses of Prozac . . . the bizarre changes inbehavior, etc.

DO NOT sit around and say it is only fish, there is no need to worry. Our entire world is balanced with each species playing an extremely important role. We do not survive if they do not survive!

And be sure to note what is said about the chlorine/flouride additives to our water when combined with these drugs! Snyder, the Arizona expert, is stating that we as humans are exposed to more of these disinfecting chemicals in our water than anything while they are so “understudied.” The truth about chemicals is that we know SO LITTLEabout any of them that we have absolutely no idea what we are exposing ourselves and our posterity to and where it could lead us as a society. Tragically the mess inwhich we now find ourselves could be a warning of what is to come if we do not wake up soon to our own insane belief system of “Better Living Through Chemistry”! We are quickly learning that we are far from invincible!!

Find below some of the highlights of this article that need to be emphasized:

- Bryan Brooks has spent a lot of time wading in Pecan Creek, a small Denton stream, searching for mutant fish. For some time, Brooks and his colleagues from the University of North Texas were observing strange things in North Texas fish—males turning into females, for example—but were unable to blame them on traditional waterpollutants like metals. The environmental toxicologists thought the mutations might have something to do with other compounds like pharmaceuticals that were showing up in freshwater streams.

Over time, they collected a bunch of fish and tested their flesh in the lab. Sure enough, they found fluoxetine (Prozac) and sertraline (Zoloft) and their human metabolites in every catfish, crappie and bluegill they tested. It was the first time researchers had proved that these human drugs were showing up in wild fish.

- Toxicologists have just begun the difficult task of figuring out what effects these contaminants might have on human health. A single contaminant might do nothing. Butin combination with others, the effect could be enhanced, particularly for vulnerable groups like children or pregnant women. What sort of health effects arise from complex mixtures of chemicals in drinking water?

photo courtesy Baylor University Bryan Brooks

Bryan Brooks has spent a lot of time wading in Pecan Creek, a small Denton stream, searching for mutant fish. For some time, Brooks and his colleagues from the University of North Texas were observing strange things in North Texas fish—males turning into females, for example—but were unable to blame them on traditional waterpollutants like metals. The environmental toxicologists thought the mutations might have something to do with other compounds like pharmaceuticals that were showing up in freshwater streams.

Over time, they collected a bunch of fish and tested their flesh in the lab. Sure enough, they found fluoxetine (Prozac) and sertraline (Zoloft) and their human metabolites inevery catfish, crappie and bluegill they tested. It was the first time researchers had proved that these human drugs were showing up in wild fish.

Brooks (now at Baylor University) is part of a growing legion of scientists and regulators studying “emerging contaminants,” a loose definition of chemicals that include prescription and over-the-counter drugs, flame retardants, animal hormones, pesticides, plasticizers and cosmetics, to name a few. Many of these unregulated contaminants pass through wastewater treatment plants and end up in streams, exposing fish and other aquatic life to an exotic chemical cocktail.

More worrisome: The same chemical-infused water ends up in our drinking water.

Take Pecan Creek. During dry spells, Pecan Creek consists of effluent from Denton’s wastewater treatment plant. The stream then flows into Lake Lewisville, a drinkingwater supply for millions in Dallas-Fort Worth. The toilet-to-tap phenomenon is becoming more common as cities look to recycled wastewater to offset diminishing freshwater supplies.

Dallas, like dozens of other cities in Texas and around the nation, has detected trace amounts of emerging contaminants in its water supplies.

“You name the compound; somebody has probably found it in somebody’s watersource or the effluent coming out of the [treatment plant],” says Charles Stringer, an assistant director of Dallas Water Utilities.

The same holds for tap water. Unwittingly, Americans are drinking a cornucopia of chemicals—albeit in tiny amounts—that in many cases we know little about.

In the most comprehensive, peer-reviewed study to date, the Southern Nevada WaterAuthority tested the tap water of 15 utilities that collectively serve 28 million Americans. Thirteen had measurable levels of contaminants, including the anti-convulsant phenytoin, the pesticide atrazine and the insecticide DEET.

Such reports have roused public concern and convinced the federal government to take a tentative step. In October, the EPA announced it’s considering pharmaceuticalsfor regulation under the Safe Drinking Water Act.

In Texas, water utilities and elected officials are only beginning to grapple with the problem. A task force created by the Texas Legislature in 2009 is looking into ways to keep pharmaceuticals out of landfills and wastewater systems. On the local level, cities are not required by federal law to test wastewater or drinking water plants for emerging contaminants. Many choose not to, partly out of fear that the results will be misinterpreted.

“If you say you’ve got aspirin in your water at one picogram per liter, somebody says, oh my god there’s aspirin in the water,” Stringer says. “The cities that are trying to be proactive and look at it are getting the hell beat out of them.”

Dallas is proactive, Stringer says. In November, the U.S. Geological Survey published the results of extensive sampling in the Elm Fork of the Trinity River, a drinking watersource for Dallas that is downstream from other cities’ discharges. The scientists also tested the water after it had been treated for people’s taps. The federal agency found that 38 of the 42 most frequently detected compounds in the river water—including the pesticide atrazine, the gasoline additive MTBE (banned in some states) and the toxic insecticide Diazinon, whose sale is illegal for non-agricultural purposes—made it into the tap water. While the concentrations didn’t exceed federal or state standards, the study notes that only half of the detected compounds have human-health benchmarksin those standards.

The city of San Marcos commissioned Texas State University toxicologist Glenn Longley and one of his students to test surface water there for 23 emerging contaminants—pharmaceuticals, fire retardants, fragrances, pesticides and others. While Longley found 18 chemicals in the water, only one—bisphenol A, or BPA, the controversial plasticizer found in Nalgene bottles—made it into the city’s tap water.

Most of these contaminants are not new. Some have been “emerging” in the environment for decades. But the development of ultrasensitive instruments has now enabled scientists to detect the compounds at concentrations down to parts per trillion. It’s as if a powerful new telescope suddenly picked up a galaxy in a previously dark part of the sky—the difference being that these chemicals hit uncomfortably close to home.

Toxicologists have just begun the difficult task of figuring out what effects these contaminants might have on human health. A single contaminant might do nothing. Butin combination with others, the effect could be enhanced, particularly for vulnerable groups like children or pregnant women. What sort of health effects arise from complex mixtures of chemicals in drinking water?

No one knows. One challenge, among many, is that it’s difficult to perform toxicity tests for humans. “It’s not like on the aquatic side,” says Dana Kolpin, head of the U.S. Geological Survey’s Emerging Contaminants in the Environment Project. “We’re doing experiments with biologists where we’re exposing minnows or other organisms to, say, effluent or spike levels. You just can’t do that with humans.”

Shane Snyder, a professor of environmental engineering at the University of Arizona and co-director of the Arizona Laboratory for Emerging Contaminants, says he’s been asked to brief a Congressional committee on this issue. It’s “very difficult” to do a risk assessment for mixtures, he says, especially when chemicals can simultaneously act on different pathways in the body. For example, one substance might damage the liver, while another present at the same time disrupts the endocrine system.

“You could get a more profound effect [collectively] than from each one separately,” says Snyder.

Snyder says there’s far more to learn—and perhaps fear—from what happens when emerging contaminants go through the treatment process. Some seem to disappear, but they could be subtly transformed into something more toxic by widely used disinfectants like chlorine.

“In my mind there is no question that humans are exposed to more disinfection byproducts than any other contaminants through their drinking water,” Snyder says. “Itconcerns me as a scientist and a toxicologist that those classes of compounds are understudied.”

About 20 percent of disinfection byproducts are regulated, Snyder says. Sixty percent haven’t even been identified.

While the effects on humans remain mysterious, the ecological effects of water-borne chemicals—even at extremely low levels—is becoming well established. And those effects can be downright bizarre.

Toxicologists and biologists have linked low concentrations of pharmaceuticals and other emerging contaminants to a host of developmental, reproductive and behavioral problems in aquatic species including algae, mussels, minnows and game fish. Astudy published in 2008 by researchers at Clemson University exposed hybrid striped bass to relatively low levels of Prozac.

The results were depressing—the more Prozac in the water, the longer it took the bass to nail their prey. The fish acted strangely, too, hovering near the surface of the aquarium, sometimes with their dorsal fins poking out of the water. Others floated vertically, tails down and mouths above the water level, like a kid dog-paddling in apool.

Antidepressants like Zoloft and Prozac work in humans by increasing serotonin, anatural chemical that helps regulate brain activity and is linked to feelings of well-being.In bass, among other functions, serotonin plays a pivotal role in feeding behavior. Changes in serotonin levels can tilt the predator-prey balance and affect not just the individual, but potentially the whole ecosystem.

It’s not just antidepressants that can make aquatic life go haywire. Even infinitesimally small amounts of the synthetic estrogen in birth control drugs can induce sex reversalsin male fish and disrupt reproduction. Canadian scientists brought an entire ecosystem to the brink of collapse by introducing estrogen—at levels frequently found inmunicipal wastewater—to an experimental lake in northern Ontario.

In 2008, a researcher for Johnson & Johnson calculated that toxic effects on fish from estrogenic substances could be expected at concentrations as low as 350 parts per quadrillion.

“If you can imagine 350 parts per quadrillion,” Snyder says, “it’s unimaginably small, but yet it can have a measurable impact on fish.”

Snyder points out that well-documented impacts on wildlife are often misinterpreted to mean humans are at risk from the same levels.

“The part where people get a little bit confused is they say, well if it can impact a fish, then certainly it could impact a human,” Snyder says. “That’s just not true. You’re comparing apples to oranges.”

Consider pharmaceuticals. Drug developers are required to submit reams of pharmacological information to the Food and Drug Administration proving their drugs are safe and work as intended. They’re tested on people. The levels found in game fish and drinking water supplies, so far, are thousands of times below therapeutic levels.

Brooks provides an illustration. In a national pilot survey of five effluent-dominated rivers, the highest level of antidepressant he and the EPA found in fish tissue wasabout 19 nanograms of Zoloft per liter in a fish outside Philadelphia.

“It would take me 3,500 meals of that fish to reach one daily dose of sertraline,” Brooks says. Likewise, someone would have to drink millions of liters of tap water to reach a single dose of Zoloft.

“From what I’ve seen in the developed world, I’m just not as concerned about human health right now. I think the highest relative risk is to aquatic life,” he says.

Utility managers are sticking to that point. “What we’ve been told to tell people is that these minute traces of organics are below any known health effects,” Stringer says.

Regardless, Dallas is planning to upgrade its drinking water plants to include ozonation and biological filtration, advanced but costly processes. The utility isn’t doing it primarily to deal with emerging contaminants, but that will be an added benefit.

“What we’re hoping to see is very little organic material coming out and going into the distribution system for consumption,” Stringer says.

If a city wants to eliminate virtually all contaminants, it would need to install advanced systems like reverse osmosis, which is extraordinarily expensive.
That’s not feasible, Snyder says.

“We just can’t put the whole world’s water supply through reverse osmosis because we’re worried about emerging contaminants,” he says. “It’s going to fail. Just on the energy alone, it will fail.”

With 80,000 chemicals registered for use in the United States and new ones coming to market every year, the key could be keeping the most dangerous ones out of the environment in the first place. For thousands of chemicals, there are “zero data” on their toxicity, Brooks says.

The European Union has implemented a sweeping system called Registration, Evaluation and Authorization of Chemicals, or REACH. The system requires testing thousands of old and new chemicals for human and environmental toxicity, and could lead to bans on high-risk chemicals that aren’t regulated in the United States.

Given the power of the pharmaceutical and chemical industries in this country, such asystem seems like a far-off goal. Jacobs, the environmental activist on the Texas pharmaceutical task force, says his group is advocating for something far more modest: manufacturer take-back programs in which consumers could return unused or expired drugs to pharmacies for proper disposal. He says the pharmaceutical interests on the task force are doing their best to discredit the idea.

Perhaps Merck should just quit while they are SO FAR BEHIND!!! As if the
Vioxx damage suits and wrongful death suits were not keeping their legal team
busy enough, now they are just beginning a huge backload of jaw death
cases related to Fosamax!

Fosamax is a drug I have warned of for years due to the fact that the main
ingredient in the drug is fluoride – yes the same stuff that is in your
drinking water at toxic levels. Fluoride is also the main active ingredient
in MANY of the SSRI antidepressants. It produces fluorosis which is almost
indistiguishable from neurosis as far as damage to the brain goes.

Why I have always warned against using it for osteoporosis is not only due
to the brain damage, but because fluoride hardens bone and does not know
when to stop. So the bones and teeth become so hard that they shatter on
impact because they become so brittle. Flouride also increases serotonin and
the main function of serotonin is constriction of muscle tissue. As the veins
and arteries close off so does the blood supply to the jawbone or anywhere
else the drug is targeting. Too bad science has never opted for using
wisdom along with knowledge!
________________________

Boles’ suit was the second of almost 900 lawsuits filed by more than 1,280
plaintiff groups against Merck over claims that Fosamax causes a condition
called osteonecrosis of the jaw, or death of jawbone tissue.

http://www.aolhealth.com/condition-center/osteoporosis/fosamax-tied-to-jaw-p

roblems?icid=main|htmlws-main-w|dl3|link4|http%3A%2F%2Fwww.aolhealth.com%2Fc
ondition-center%2Fosteoporosis%2Ffosamax-tied-to-jaw-problems

Damage Related to ‘Jaw Death’
Woman Awarded $8M After Osteoporosis Drug Damages Jaw
Print
EmailMore
By Marrecca Fiore

A jury last week ordered Merck & Co. to pay $8 million to a Florida woman
who alleged the company’s osteoporosis drug Fosamax damaged her jaw.

The same case ended in mistrial nine months ago, Reuters reports. Merck
issued a statement saying it would challenge the verdict.

Shirley Boles, 71, of Walton Beach, Florida, sued Merck in 2006, claiming
she suffered dental and jaw problems after taking Fosamax from 1997 to 2006.

“Today’s verdict is just the first step, but it’s important because the
jury found that Merck defectively designed the drug,” Boles’s attorney Tim
O’Brien said in a statement.

Boles’ suit was the second of almost 900 lawsuits filed by more than 1,280
plaintiff groups against Merck over claims that Fosamax causes a condition
called osteonecrosis of the jaw, or death of jawbone tissue.

Although Boles’ won her suit, another suit decided in May by New York jury
found in favor of Merck.

“Both the finding and the amount of the compensatory damages are against
the weight of the evidence,” Bruce Kuhlik, executive vice president and
general counsel for Merck, said in a statement. “We believe the evidence showed
that FOSAMAX did not cause the plaintiff’s injury and that it is a safe
and effective medication that was properly designed.”

Two studies, one in 2005 and one in May of this year, found that
osteoporosis drugs such as Fosamax, Actonel, Boniva and Zometa or Reclast were
linked to osteonecrosis of the jaw. However, government regulators have said
the risks are rare and that the benefits of such drugs outweigh the risks.

When osteonecrosis of the jaw develops, the blood supply of the bone in
the jaw is interrupted and the bone dies. Pain, tooth loss, and the
appearance of exposed bone are common symptoms.

More on Osteonecrosis of the Jaw:
Osteonecrosis of the Jaw Caused by Bisphosphonates

Just today a Canadian Coroner’s Jury has made several recommendations in
the way patients taking SSRIs are warned of the risks of taking these
medications with alcohol or other drugs!! Two decades is all it took to FINALLY
get this kind of warning even though it had to come from a courtroom rather
than from any of the antidepressant manufacturers! The population suffering
the most serious and deadly side effects of the SSRI antidepressants has
ALWAYS been those with drug or alcohol problems or those with hypoglycemia
(which is alcoholism or what is called a “dry alcoholic” – check out the
work of Dr. James Milam).

As mentioned below in the SSRIstories note what has not been included that
should have been in big bold print years ago is that ANTIDEPRESSANTS
PRODUCE OVERWHELMING CRAVINGS FOR ALCOHOL [PATIENTS ALSO REPORT SIMILAR PROBLEMS
WITH ILLEGAL DRUGS]. So, although this is a big breakthrough in warning of
the extremely serious potential of mixing antidepressants with alcohol and
illegal drugs, it does not go far enough and explain that the use of an
antidepressant itself may cause you to mix it with alcohol or other drugs.
The use of the antidepressant sets you up for the most serious side effects
in producing these alcohol cravings;
___________________________________________

In a message dated 6/28/2010 12:58:35 P.M. Central Daylight Time,
gm1000@prodigy.net writes:
Last two paragraphs read: “Among its many suggestions, the jury
recommended the Ontario College of Physicians and Surgeons train doctors
administering these drugs to “inform the patient of the benefits and risk ­
including rare and serious side effects of SSRIs and of reasonable alternative
treatments, and the risks of taking such medications while consuming alcohol
or narcotics.

“ ‘If those recommendations were in place a few years ago, Sara would be
alive today,’ said Neil Carlin. ‘We consider this a great victory’.”

SSRI Stories note: The Physicians Desk Reference lists “Alcohol Craving”
as an infrequent, but not rare, side-effect for Paxil. Also, SSRIs may
cause a craving for illegal drugs such as cocaine by inducing mania or mood
swings in those taking such antidepressants.

http://www.torontosun.com/news/canada/2010/06/28/14544386.html

Changes recommended to the way patients informed about anti-depressants
By SAM PAZZANO, Courts Bureau

Last Updated: June 28, 2010 12:37pm

An Oakville teen using an anti-depressant drug died after hanging herself
while “affected by depression, cocaine and ethanol,” a coroner’s jury
ruled Monday.

Sara Carlin, an 18-year-old scholar and outstanding athlete committed
suicide on May 6, 2007, at her Oakville home, 14 months after she had began
taking the anti-depressant drug Paxil, which is a type of drug known as
selective serotonin re-uptake inhibitors (SSRIs). She had also been using cocaine
and drinking heavily.

Carlin’s parents, Neil and Rhonda were visibly pleased after the jury
released its verdict and also made several recommendations aimed at preventing
similar suicides.

Among its many suggestions, the jury recommended the Ontario College of P
hysicians and Surgeons train doctors administering these drugs to “inform
the patient of the benefits and risk ­ including rare and serious side
effects of SSRIs” and of reasonable alternative treatments, and the risks of
taking such medications while consuming alcohol or narcotics.

“If those recommendations were in place a few years ago, Sara would be
alive today,” said Neil Carlin. “We consider this a great victory.”

This reminds me of a case I had in Florida years ago where a young man was
staying with friends and had been a little “down” lately. He remembered
that the wife in the family had a bottle of Zoloft she had placed on top of
the fridge instead of taking it because she did not like how it made her
feel. He knew it was for depression and thought it might make him feel better
so he took one.

After a little while he did not feel any difference so he took another, and
another, and another until he had taken six pills. After that he cannot
remember anything about what happened. All he knows is what others told him
he did which was he started drinking and then stabbed a stranger over 100
times with a screwdriver killing him. He is now spending the rest of his life
in prison.
________________________________________________

Paragraph two reads: “Adrien John Lepage, 55, had told the court he
robbed and kidnapped the young woman in the hope police would kill him and put
him out of his misery. He wasn’t thinking straight and didn’t mean to hurt
anyone, he said.”

Paragraph seven reads: “Lepage testified last Friday that he suffers from
depression and that on the morning of Nov. 30, he took six times his
prescribed dose of anti-depressant medication.”

_http://www.cbc.ca/canada/new-brunswick/story/2010/04/15/nb-attempted-murder
-verdict.html_
(http://www.cbc.ca/canada/new-brunswick/story/2010/04/15/nb-attempted-murder-verdict.html)

N.B. kidnapper found guilty of attempted murder

Last Updated: Thursday, April 15, 2010 | 3:50 PM AT

CBC News

Adrien John Lepage is escorted by police on Dec. 1, 2009. (CBC)

A Saint John man has been found guilty of attempted murder in connection
with the kidnapping of a bartender who was abandoned in a remote gravel pit
with a plastic bag taped around her head.

Adrien John Lepage, 55, had told the court he robbed and kidnapped the
young woman in the hope police would kill him and put him out of his misery.
He wasn’t thinking straight and didn’t mean to hurt anyone, he said.

Hampton provincial court Judge Henrik Tonning wasn’t convinced. He said no
matter how hard he looked for reasonable doubt, he could not find any.

Lepage, who was taking notes in the prisoner’s box throughout Thursday’s
proceedings, showed no reaction to the guilty verdict.

He will be sentenced on May 27 on the attempted murder charge, to which he
had pleaded not guilty. He will also be sentenced on charges of unlawful
confinement and theft, to which he had pleaded guilty.

The judge ordered a pre-sentence report and victim impact statement.

Left for dead

Lepage testified last Friday that he suffers from depression and that on
the morning of Nov. 30, he took six times his prescribed dose of
anti-depressant medication.

He also said he had been having problems with his girlfriend that day,
before he walked into the Barnwood Pub in Quispamsis, in southern New
Brunswick.

The bartender had testified that Lepage ordered food and drinks before
approaching her at the bar and telling her he would blow her head off if she
didn’t give him the money in the cash register.

He told her to carry the $400 outside, away from the pub’s security
cameras, she said. Then he threw her into his van and drove 55 kilometres to a
gravel pit near Lepreau. He said: “Have a nice life,” then drove away, she
told the court.

The woman, who had no coat, was soaking wet and covered in mud, with her
arms and legs bound with duct tape. She managed to free herself and walk to
Highway 1, where two drivers pulled over to help her.

Why don’t psychiatrists notice when patients experience medication side
effects?

Booze and pills alert after Bertie tragedy

ANTIDEPRESSANTS CAUSE CRAVINGS FOR ALCOHOL!!!! [AM I SHOUTING? YES I AM SHOUTING!!! AND I HAVE BEEN SHOUTING THAT ANTIDEPRESSANTS CAUSE CRAVINGS FOR ALCOHOL FOR TWO DECADES!] LET ME REPEAT THAT: ANTIDEPRESSANTS CAUSE CRAVINGS FOR ALCOHOL!!!!!

Antidepressants cause this alcohol craving in several ways:

- by dropping the blood sugar
- by producing mania, one type of mania is known as “dipsomania” which is described as an “uncontrollable urge to drink alcohol”
- by increasing serotonin which has been shown in medical research to cause cravings for alcohol (see SSRIs & Alcoho at www.drugawareness.org)
________________________________

Paragraph four reads: “But an inquest heard he had secretly been battling depression after splitting with the mother of his daughter – and in the early hours of New Year’s Day he was found dead in his home in Mold, North Wales.”

Paragraph thirteen reads: “When their relationship broke down, he moved back into his family home where he began a course of anti-depressant drugs.”

Paragraph twenty reads: “Toxicology results showed he was more than three times the drink-drive limit. . . ”

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1267219/Robert-Gallagher-UK-Olympic-judo-hopeful-hangs-black-belt.html

Monday, Apr 19 2010 3PM

British judo star tipped for Olympic glory hangs himself with own black belt after breaking up with girlfriend
By Daily Mail Reporter

Last updated at 1:39 PM on 19th April 2010

A British judo star tipped for success at the 2012 Olympics hanged himself with his own black belt after struggling to get over splitting from his girlfriend, an inquest heard.

Firefighter Robert ‘Robbie’ Gallagher, 23, was so talented in martial arts he was listed as one of the amateur sportsmen expected to shine during the London Olympics.

He was known across the Judo world for fighting in the 66kg weight category and was one of Britain’s top judo players in 2005, when he was in the British junior squad.

But an inquest heard he had secretly been battling depression after splitting with the mother of his daughter – and in the early hours of New Year’s Day he was found dead in his home in Mold, North Wales.

His father Robert Gallagher Snr, said: ‘We as a family are so saddened by Robbie’s untimely death and we miss him greatly.

‘He was into his judo and was a contender for the 2012 Olympic games and was a retained firefighter, hoping to have a future full-time in firefighting.

‘He had been a mischievous happy person and enjoyed his life. He wanted to achieve the very best.’

Mr Gallagher started judo when he was five before later taking up the sport at the highest level.

He was British judo champion three times and represented North Wales Fire and Rescue Service at the 2008 World Firefighting Games at the Echo Arena, Liverpool.

A British Judo Association spokeswoman said after his death: ‘British judo is extremely saddened by the loss of Robbie Gallagher.

‘A talented judo player, Robbie will be missed by players and coaches alike.’

An inquest heard last Friday how Robbie had been with girlfriend Sophie Bell-Halfpenny for four years, and together they shared a home and daughter Evie.

When their relationship broke down, he moved back into his family home where he began a course of anti-depressant drugs.

Miss Bell-Halfpenny told the hearing her former partner had threatened suicide on several occasions, explaining: ‘He once phoned me at 4am to say he had taken an overdose of sleeping tablets.

‘Then he came up to my house and and was waving his judo belts at me saying he was going to take his own life.’

The inquest in Mold heard how the judo ace had gone to a pub on New Year’s Eve to see in 2010 with some friends but had then gone back home to hang himself.

His father said he did not realise his son had returned home early until he went to have a cigarette outside shortly after midnight, and heard a noise from their garage.

He stepped inside and made the horrific discovery of his son hanging by his own judo belt.

A post-mortem examination revealed the father-of-one had died from asphyxia caused by hanging.

Toxicology results showed he was more than three times the drink-drive limit. He did not leave a note.

Recording a verdict of suicide, North East Wales coroner John Hughes, told the family: ‘I want to tell you how desperately sad I was to hear of your misfortune, especially as it was someone as young as your boy.’

After hearing of his death last January, a spokesman for his former school, Alun School, said: ‘We are very sad to hear this news.

‘He was a very outgoing character who was well liked by all the staff. He always had a big smile on his face.

‘We remember him fondly as a very fit lad, he could turn his hand to anything, but judo was his sport.

‘Robbie was one of the most gifted athletes we had at the school. He excelled at judo and represented Wales and the UK.

‘He was an excellent judo player and at one time he was in the top group for his age.’

Did war vet kill self to make a statement?

Man had been in VA emergency room earlier in the morning.

Studies suggest the average woman inadvertently consumes about 4 pounds of
lipstick over the course of her life, licking her lips, eating fruit,
sipping tea.

The Campaign for Safe Cosmetics . . . “The reason we’re worried is that
lead builds up in the body over time,” Malkan said. “Even small levels of
lead, recent science shows, is dangerous at any level to developing children.”

Studies suggest that while most lead we encounter is cleared from our
bodies, some of it is incorporated into bones. During pregnancy, breast-feeding,
and again after menopause, a woman’s blood levels of lead rise as stored
calcium — and bone lead — is released, even if she’s not encountered lead
in years.

How much lead is dangerous? The Mayo Clinic says 10 micrograms of lead per
deciliter can cause brain damage in children. Lower levels have been linked
to developmental delays, aggression, attention and learning problems.

“There is no safe level of lead in blood,” Florida’s Department of Health
states in a report on lead poisoning.

FDA TESTS LIPSTICKS, FINDS LEAD IN ALL

Submitted by Drew Kaplan on June 8, 2010

We twist it, glide it, paint it on, and suddenly we feel attractive,
composed, sexy and ready for the world.

Drenched in shades of sangria, dahlia, ruby, cherry and garnet, our
lipstick-stained mouths exude health.

But looks can deceive.

Tests conducted by the FDA last year on 22 red lipsticks found lead, a
neurotoxin, in every single lipstick sample studied.

The highest levels were in three well-known and common brands: Cover Girl,
Revlon, L’Oreal. While the FDA says it’s continuing lead research on
additional cosmetic brands and colors, it’s reassuring consumers that the lead
levels it found in the red lipsticks are very small and not a health threat.

The FDA does not regulate lead in finished cosmetics, only in colors added
to the products. None of the products exceeded the 20 parts per million
limit on colors, the agency said.

An industry trade group, the Personal Care Products Council, said
manufacturers don’t intentionally add lead.

“Because lead is found naturally in air, water, and soil, it may also be
found at extremely low levels as a trace contaminant in the raw ingredients
used in formulating cosmetics, just as it is in many thousands of other
products,” the group states.

The Campaign for Safe Cosmetics isn’t buying it.

The lead found in Cover Girl Incredifull Lipcolor Maximum Red was 34 times
higher than the lead found in the lowest scoring lipstick, Avon’s Ultra
Color Rich Cherry Jubilee. Clearly, the manufacturers are capable of doing
better, said the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics’ Stacy Malkan.

Cover Girl’s media center at Procter & Gamble did not respond to repeated
requests for comment.
“I think some companies are not doing a good job sourcing their
ingredients,” Malkan said.

Studies suggest the average woman inadvertently consumes about 4 pounds of
lipstick over the course of her life, licking her lips, eating fruit,
sipping tea.

The Campaign for Safe Cosmetics is calling on the FDA to require cosmetics
manufacturers to reduce lead to the lowest achievable levels, a policy the
FDA already has adopted for candy.

“The reason we’re worried is that lead builds up in the body over time,”
Malkan said. “Even small levels of lead, recent science shows, is dangerous
at any level to developing children.”

Studies suggest that while most lead we encounter is cleared from our
bodies, some of it is incorporated into bones. During pregnancy, breast-feeding,
and again after menopause, a woman’s blood levels of lead rise as stored
calcium — and bone lead — is released, even if she’s not encountered lead
in years.

How much lead is dangerous? The Mayo Clinic says 10 micrograms of lead per
deciliter can cause brain damage in children. Lower levels have been linked
to developmental delays, aggression, attention and learning problems.

“There is no safe level of lead in blood,” Florida’s Department of Health
states in a report on lead poisoning.
Florida ranked eighth in the nation for lead poisoning cases, it said.

Some of the most dangerous and pervasive sources of lead come from leaded
gasoline and leaded paint, which have been banned in the United States for
many years. Paint dust and flakes in old homes continue to poison hundreds
of children each year in Florida. Even low levels of lead in young children
can cause developmental delays, “Florida has an estimated 433,000 homes
built before 1950 that are likely to contain lead- based paint. Other
significant sources include some pottery, imported home remedies, candy, makeup,
jewelry, toys, mini-blinds, and take-home-lead,” such as construction dust,
the health department said.

A new Environmental Protection Agency rule requires paint and home repair
contractors to be trained and certified in safe work practices. This should
help reduce some exposures, but lead in finished cosmetics continues to go
unregulated.

What should consumers do? Malkan noted that glosses generally tested lower
for lead than highly pigmented, opaque lipsticks, so that’s what she uses.

Using fewer personal care products is probably a good idea, especially the
fragranced ones, she said.
“We need to change the laws to require companies to disclose what’s in
their products,” Malkan said.

Studies suggest the average woman inadvertently consumes about 4 pounds of
lipstick over the course of her life, licking her lips, eating fruit,
sipping tea.

The Campaign for Safe Cosmetics . . . “The reason we’re worried is that
lead builds up in the body over time,” Malkan said. “Even small levels of
lead, recent science shows, is dangerous at any level to developing children.”

Studies suggest that while most lead we encounter is cleared from our
bodies, some of it is incorporated into bones. During pregnancy, breast-feeding,
and again after menopause, a woman’s blood levels of lead rise as stored
calcium — and bone lead — is released, even if she’s not encountered lead
in years.

How much lead is dangerous? The Mayo Clinic says 10 micrograms of lead per
deciliter can cause brain damage in children. Lower levels have been linked
to developmental delays, aggression, attention and learning problems.

“There is no safe level of lead in blood,” Florida’s Department of Health
states in a report on lead poisoning.

FDA TESTS LIPSTICKS, FINDS LEAD IN ALL

Submitted by Drew Kaplan on June 8, 2010

We twist it, glide it, paint it on, and suddenly we feel attractive,
composed, sexy and ready for the world.

Drenched in shades of sangria, dahlia, ruby, cherry and garnet, our
lipstick-stained mouths exude health.

But looks can deceive.

Tests conducted by the FDA last year on 22 red lipsticks found lead, a
neurotoxin, in every single lipstick sample studied.

The highest levels were in three well-known and common brands: Cover Girl,
Revlon, L’Oreal. While the FDA says it’s continuing lead research on
additional cosmetic brands and colors, it’s reassuring consumers that the lead
levels it found in the red lipsticks are very small and not a health threat.

The FDA does not regulate lead in finished cosmetics, only in colors added
to the products. None of the products exceeded the 20 parts per million
limit on colors, the agency said.

An industry trade group, the Personal Care Products Council, said
manufacturers don’t intentionally add lead.

“Because lead is found naturally in air, water, and soil, it may also be
found at extremely low levels as a trace contaminant in the raw ingredients
used in formulating cosmetics, just as it is in many thousands of other
products,” the group states.

The Campaign for Safe Cosmetics isn’t buying it.

The lead found in Cover Girl Incredifull Lipcolor Maximum Red was 34 times
higher than the lead found in the lowest scoring lipstick, Avon’s Ultra
Color Rich Cherry Jubilee. Clearly, the manufacturers are capable of doing
better, said the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics’ Stacy Malkan.

Cover Girl’s media center at Procter & Gamble did not respond to repeated
requests for comment.
“I think some companies are not doing a good job sourcing their
ingredients,” Malkan said.

Studies suggest the average woman inadvertently consumes about 4 pounds of
lipstick over the course of her life, licking her lips, eating fruit,
sipping tea.

The Campaign for Safe Cosmetics is calling on the FDA to require cosmetics
manufacturers to reduce lead to the lowest achievable levels, a policy the
FDA already has adopted for candy.

“The reason we’re worried is that lead builds up in the body over time,”
Malkan said. “Even small levels of lead, recent science shows, is dangerous
at any level to developing children.”

Studies suggest that while most lead we encounter is cleared from our
bodies, some of it is incorporated into bones. During pregnancy, breast-feeding,
and again after menopause, a woman’s blood levels of lead rise as stored
calcium — and bone lead — is released, even if she’s not encountered lead
in years.

How much lead is dangerous? The Mayo Clinic says 10 micrograms of lead per
deciliter can cause brain damage in children. Lower levels have been linked
to developmental delays, aggression, attention and learning problems.

“There is no safe level of lead in blood,” Florida’s Department of Health
states in a report on lead poisoning.
Florida ranked eighth in the nation for lead poisoning cases, it said.

Some of the most dangerous and pervasive sources of lead come from leaded
gasoline and leaded paint, which have been banned in the United States for
many years. Paint dust and flakes in old homes continue to poison hundreds
of children each year in Florida. Even low levels of lead in young children
can cause developmental delays, “Florida has an estimated 433,000 homes
built before 1950 that are likely to contain lead- based paint. Other
significant sources include some pottery, imported home remedies, candy, makeup,
jewelry, toys, mini-blinds, and take-home-lead,” such as construction dust,
the health department said.

A new Environmental Protection Agency rule requires paint and home repair
contractors to be trained and certified in safe work practices. This should
help reduce some exposures, but lead in finished cosmetics continues to go
unregulated.

What should consumers do? Malkan noted that glosses generally tested lower
for lead than highly pigmented, opaque lipsticks, so that’s what she uses.

Using fewer personal care products is probably a good idea, especially the
fragranced ones, she said.
“We need to change the laws to require companies to disclose what’s in
their products,” Malkan said.

Simple test can detect signs of suicidal thoughts in people taking antidepressants

Tying the rise in mental illness to drugs used in its treatment

From the last paragraph in the article below I quote the author: “I will say only this: I no longer count on Lexapro to make me well. Which is to say I no longer fret if I miss a day or two, I no longer rush to the drug store to get my refills, and I place far more importance on getting my life in order: regulating my alcohol consumption, getting a decent night’s sleep, exercising (I’m not the only depressive who’s become an amateur triathlete) and, corny as it sounds, pausing at intervals to ponder my blessings.”

Although there are some good ideas mentioned here that I have been recommending forever for depressives such as the great importance of sleep and exercise and counting one’s blessings, there are other things that could produce life-threatening consequences for both the author who is using an SSRI or those around him. Those areas of grave concern are the consumption of alcohol with an antidepressant and the lack of concern about skipping a pill or picking up a refill for his Lexapro – both all too common with antidepressant users.

Why are they common although dangerous? They are common because of two side effects produced by these drugs:

1, Antidepressants can produce overwhelming cravings for alcohol as well as a tolerance for alcohol and then when mixed can produce toxic effects leading to psychotic breaks.

2. Antidepressants produce what the patients call the “I don’t give a damn” attitude leading one to not care about missing a pill or refilling a prescription. The grave concern with this is the warning put in place by the FDA along with the Black Box warning of suicide. That FDA warning is that ANY ABRUPT CHANGE IN DOSE of an antidepressant can produce suicide, hostility or psychosis – generally a manic psychosis. Skipping a pill is an abrupt change in dose as is starting or stopping the use of one of these drugs or switching the brand of antidepressant you are taking. If you survive a manic psychosis instead of being told what caused that psychotic break, you will likely be diagnosed as Bipolar and/or spend the rest of your life in prison for what you did while psychotic. The possibilities can be more than just frightening!

Paragraphs 18 through 22 read:

” ‘How’s the Lexapro working’?”

” ‘I don’t know’.”

‘Agnosticism, I’ve found, is a common refrain among my medicated friends. We’re feeling OK, thanks. Is it the pill? Natural cycles? A good week at work? The fact that the sun is shining? Not always apparent. The only thing we’re really clear on, honestly, is our side effects. Nausea, nightmares, hypomania, agitation, headaches, decreased sex drive, decreased sex performance … the list is exquisite in its variation. My first two nights on Lexapro, I lay for hours on the precipice of unconsciousness, unable to take the last plunge. To fall asleep, I had to get a prescription for Ambien, which I then spent another week weaning myself off. To this day, the prospect of sleep holds a mild terror for me that it never did before.’

‘Oddly enough, the side effects are often the pills’ best advocates. If we’re feeling that crappy, we figure something of great moment is happening inside us. What’s harder to accept is the alternative explanation — that, when it comes to depression, we’re still wandering in the dark. As Charles Barber, author of “Comfortably Numb,” argues, scientists don’t really know how antidepressants work. ‘They change the brain chemistry, but the infinite spiral of what they do from there is very unclear’.”

“So if you don’t know how something works, and you can no longer credibly claim it does work (even some industry spokesmen are beginning to qualify their claims), you’re not left with much of a fallback position. The placebo effect is real — the body actually does heal itself when it believes it is being healed — but it is founded on faith, and in the wake of the JAMA study, it’s becoming harder and harder to maintain that faith except through a rather larger act of denial.”

http://www.salon.com/life/feature/2010/04/05/is_my_lexapro_working/

Monday, Apr 5, 2010 04:01 EDT

My antidepressant gets harder to swallow

As studies shed doubt on certain psychiatric drugs, I wonder: Do I really need my little white pill?

By Louis Bayard

Salon

I take it every morning, right after I brush my teeth. A single white pill, with the letters F and L stamped on one side, the number 10 on the other. It’s so small it nearly disappears into the folds of my palm. You could drop it in my orange juice or my breakfast cereal, and I’d swallow it without a hitch.

And, for the last three years, I have been swallowing my Lexapro — and everything that comes along with it. And, apparently, I’m not alone.

Between 1996 and 2005, the number of Americans taking antidepressants doubled. According to the Centers for Disease Control, antidepressants are now the most commonly prescribed class of drugs in the U.S. — ahead of drugs for cholesterol, blood pressure and asthma. Of the 2.4 billion drugs prescribed in 2005, 118 million were for depression. Whether the pills go by the name of Lexapro or Effexor or Prozac or Wellbutrin, we’re downing them, to the tune of $9.6 billion a year, and we’re doing it for a very good and simple reason. They’re supposed to be making us better.

Which leaves a quite massive shoe waiting to drop. What if these costly, widely marketed, bewitchingly commonplace drugs really aren’t fixing our brains?

The implications are troubling, and not just for the pharmaceutical industry. In a study published last January by the Journal of the American Medical Association, scientists conducting a meta-analysis of existing research found that antidepressants were unquestionably “useful in cases of severe depression” but frankly not much help for the rest of us. “The magnitude of benefit of antidepressant medication compared with placebo,” the study’s authors concluded, “may be minimal or nonexistent, on average, in patients with mild or moderate symptoms.”

In other words, antidepressants work, but only because we believe they’re working. If we’re not seriously depressed and we’re taking a tricyclic or a serotonin reuptake inhibitor or a norepinephrine booster, we’d fare about as well with a sugar pill. Which means that antidepressants are, to borrow the phraseology of Newsweek writer Martha Begley, “basically expensive Tic Tacs.”

And so, like millions of Americans, I’m left with the problem of it: that little white pill that travels down my gullet every morning. What is it really doing down there — up there? What if it’s not doing anything? Is there any good empirical unassailable reason that I should be swallowing it day after day after day? If I stop believing in it, will it stop working?

More than half a century has passed since the first antidepressants were prescribed, but it’s fair to say that the opposition to them coalesced in the 1990s, with the explosive sales growth of Prozac. As critics like David Healy and Ronald W. Dworkin warned that Big Pharma was medicalizing sadness for profit, the widespread usage of ironic terms like “happy pills” conjured up visions of smiling zombies wandering through sinister dreamscapes. Eric G. Wilson, in his overwrought “Against Happiness,” actually envisioned a day when antidepressants would “destroy dejection completely” and “eradicate depression forever.”

Looking back, we can see that both critics and advocates were working from the same premise: that these drugs change us in some fairly profound way. (Even pro-drug Peter Fisher [Kramer], in his bestselling “Listening to Prozac,” worried about the cost of making people “better than well.”) But as researchers like Irving Kirsch and Guy Sapirstein are increasingly finding, the truth may shade more toward the comic end of the spectrum. Far from transforming us, antidepressants are leaving us pretty much as they found us. Emperors in gleaming new clothes.

The more I ponder my experience, the less surprised I am. I turned to medication because I couldn’t stop crying in public places — Starbucks was a popular spot — or imagining my death. (Crucially, I never got around to planning it.) And because I realized that although I was meeting life’s core requirements, I was not always exceeding them. And because, after a couple of years of sessions with an empathetic therapist, I came to believe that my wiring really had shorted out, that some form of grayer matter had fastened itself to my brain and was hard at work, siphoning away my joy.

I remember watching the camcorder footage of my son’s first birthday party and being shocked by the sight of myself, staring back at the camera with sad eyes. Depression had always been a sporadic companion, but in my 43rd year, it began to take up permanent residence. I felt like I was walking around on rotting floorboards. I cried. I lost my temper on the flimsiest of pretexts. I saw myself dead.

At which point medication seemed like a reasonable alternative. Before another week had passed, I had secured a low-dosage prescription for Lexapro, prescribed not by my therapist but by my primary-care physician. (Even that’s not quite true. It was the doctor who was taking my doctor’s patients while she was on vacation.)

“Who’s going to monitor this drug?” my partner asked.

“Um … you? Me?”

When it came to Lexapro, all my responses had the same interrogative lilt. If someone asked me how I was feeling, I’d say, “Better, I guess?” When asked if I would recommend Lexapro to others, I’d say: “Maybe kind of?”

This was the most surprising part of the whole experience: that the transformation or malformation I had expected to feel never quite arrived, that in the course of ramping up my serotonin levels, I should remain so freakishly myself.

It is, in fact, one of the amusing side effects of living in the age of pharmaceuticals that you can always compare your lack of progress with those nearest and dearest to you in this case, my mother. Not a lunch goes by that one of us doesn’t say to the other:

“How’s the Lexapro working?”

“I don’t know.”

Agnosticism, I’ve found, is a common refrain among my medicated friends. We’re feeling OK, thanks. Is it the pill? Natural cycles? A good week at work? The fact that the sun is shining? Not always apparent. The only thing we’re really clear on, honestly, is our side effects. Nausea, nightmares, hypomania, agitation, headaches, decreased sex drive, decreased sex performance … the list is exquisite in its variation. My first two nights on Lexapro, I lay for hours on the precipice of unconsciousness, unable to take the last plunge. To fall asleep, I had to get a prescription for Ambien, which I then spent another week weaning myself off. To this day, the prospect of sleep holds a mild terror for me that it never did before.

Oddly enough, the side effects are often the pills’ best advocates. If we’re feeling that crappy, we figure something of great moment is happening inside us. What’s harder to accept is the alternative explanation — that, when it comes to depression, we’re still wandering in the dark. As Charles Barber, author of “Comfortably Numb,” argues, scientists don’t really know how antidepressants work. “They change the brain chemistry, but the infinite spiral of what they do from there is very unclear.”

So if you don’t know how something works, and you can no longer credibly claim it does work (even some industry spokesmen are beginning to qualify their claims), you’re not left with much of a fallback position. The placebo effect is real — the body actually does heal itself when it believes it is being healed — but it is founded on faith, and in the wake of the JAMA study, it’s becoming harder and harder to maintain that faith except through a rather larger act of denial.

Of course, even the most ardent critics of antidepressants caution strongly against sudden withdrawal. (Those side effects suck, too.) And few scientists will deny that drugs help people with severe unipolar depression. But what of the rest of us? Should we find some way to make ourselves believe in our little white pills again? Or should we find other things to believe in? Should we, in fact, begin to rethink our relationships with our brains?

I don’t bring much in the way of ideology to these questions. I’ve always felt that the rise of Prozac and its ilk at least had the salutary effect of removing the stigma attached to depression. Reconfigured as a chemical condition, it could now be owned and acknowledged and treated. But by translating it from the personal to the pharmacological, we may have left people even less empowered to combat it.

It’s bracing to see how depression is treated in other countries, where the relationship between drug manufacturers and physicians isn’t quite so hand-in-glove. Great Britain’s National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence, for example, recommends that, before taking antidepressants, people with mild or moderate depression should undergo nine to 12 weeks of guided self-help, nine to 12 weeks of cognitive behavioral therapy, and 10 to 14 weeks of exercise classes. They should, in short, work on themselves before they can be worked upon.

Unfortunately, as Barber notes, that’s work, and not always pleasant. If we are to be honest with ourselves, we should admit that the drug companies aren’t the only ones who want that pill. We want it, too. If every last antidepressant were to vanish from the market today and a new one were to appear tomorrow, promising greater benefits than before, which of us would not line up? There is, after all, a strength in numbers, whereas grappling with yourself — your self — is a lonely business.

But it is, finally, a necessary one. The little white pill sits in my palm. In the glare of the bathroom light, I give it a good hard searching look. And then once more I clap it in my mouth and swallow it down.

Maybe, as one team of researchers has suggested, it’s the triumph of marketing over science. Maybe, as Samuel Johnson once said of second marriages, it’s the triumph of hope over experience. Maybe I’m just weak.

I will say only this: I no longer count on Lexapro to make me well. Which is to say I no longer fret if I miss a day or two, I no longer rush to the drug store to get my refills, and I place far more importance on getting my life in order: regulating my alcohol consumption, getting a decent night’s sleep, exercising (I’m not the only depressive who’s become an amateur triathlete) and, corny as it sounds, pausing at intervals to ponder my blessings. And also appreciating the ways in which my brain and body regulate their own climate through such time-honored techniques as the crying jag. Which is no less effective for happening in the middle of a busy Starbucks.

Three years and however many dollars later, can I honestly say Lexapro has made me a happier person? No. Has it usefully complicated my thinking? Maybe. In my pre-pill days, I regarded happiness as a form of grace, descending upon me whether or not I was worthy of it. Now I think of it as something that, however elusive, is there to be sought. Swallowing a pill every morning is not, in my mind, an act of obedience but a tiny spark of volition, a sign that I’m willing to find the light wherever it’s hiding. My Lexapro may be no better than a Tic Tac, but it’s a daily reminder that I won’t take depression’s shit lying down.

And who did they pay to “cook the books” on this research?!! Was the same
researcher who just plead guilty to falsifying research for GlaxcoThe initial
studies done by Lilly on dogs and cats demonstrated that the animals given

Prozac began to growl and hiss within days on the drug and the behavior
continued until several days AFTER withdrawal of the medication. Those results
would indicate a contraindication for Prozac being given to dogs as they
have for close to two decades now.

The only thing new with Reconcile, the name of the drug in the US, is
that it is a time release Prozac. All the time released change does is make
it FAR MORE difficult to withdraw from. If your dog happens to be a
rapid metabolizer then he/she will metabolize the drug faster than expected and
go into withdrawal before the next dose is given. And according to FDA warnings
you could have a dog that could be going into a withdrawal reactions
of suicide, hostility, or psychosis. . . . We need to do a survey to see
how many dogs are running in front of mack trucks and trains instead of just
chasing cars once they begin taking this medication.  :-)
 . . . . Back to the seriousness of this issue, this is an
extremely dangerous way for dogs and humans or any other living creature to take
a drug!

____________________________________

At the time, Steve Connell, Eli Lilly’s manager of consumer services for
companion animal health, said that more than 10million US dogs exhibit strange
symptoms from being left alone too long. [Hmmmmm and how many humans and other
living creatures exhibit strange symptoms from being left alone too
long?!!!]

‘Lilly research shows that 10.7million, or up to 17 per cent, of US dogs
suffer from separation anxiety,’ he said. ‘We’re thrilled that our first product
for dogs can help restore the human-pet bond.’

He said research showed that 73 per cent of dogs taking Reconcile and
undergoing therapy showed better behaviour within eight weeks, compared to dogs

receiving therapy alone.