It seems like mental health problems are on the rise, as is our need for medications – or is it? According to James Davies, author of Cracked and a psychological therapist who has worked for the NHS and the mental health charity Mind, this rise in mental illness is down to the pursuit of medical status.
Davies interviewed Sarah Jones, a mother of two and a care worker in West London, about her seven-year-old son Dominic. ‘Dominic is a lovely boy, but last year he started getting agitated and aggressive. He was doing badly at school and then he got into a fight,’ she says, adding that her son was diagnosed with ADHD after a 25-minute doctor’s assessment. ‘Dominic is on pills. He seems less distracted sometimes, but he also doesn’t seem himself either. It feels as if a part of his spirit has gone.’
In the past ten years, ADHD diagnoses have risen so sharply that roughly 5% of children in Europe are thought to have it, and an estimated 15% of children fall under the criteria of a diagnosable mental disorder. This figure was more like one in 100 in the Fifties, so why has child mental wellness taken such a turn for the worse? Davies argues that much of the profession’s claimed knowledge about diagnosing mental illness is scientifically baseless, as scientifically objective tests don’t exist in psychiatry.
According to Dr Robert Spitzer, the Columbia University psychiatrist, who was in charge of compiling the third edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), which sets the trend for modern psychiatric practice, ‘There are only a handful of mental disorders in the DSM known to have a clear biological cause. These are known as the organic disorders [such as epilepsy and Alzheimer’s]. These are few and far between.’
Renee Garfinkel, a psychologist who participated in two committees that helped to compile the DSM-III, commented ‘On one occasion there was a discussion about whether a particular behaviour should be classed as a symptom of a particular disorder. To my astonishment, one committee member piped up: “Oh no, no, we can’t include that behaviour as a symptom, because I do that.” So it was decided that behaviour would not be included because, presumably, if someone on the committee does it, it must be normal.’
Comments are closed.