It would be good for the network to support this.
Jan
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Paul@home" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Thursday, November 22, 2007 5:57 PM
Subject: [COMMUNITYPSYCHUK] urgent support needed for SUG


Dear network,
I have previously mentioned the Seroxat SSRI User Group (SUG)
[http://www.seroxatusergroup.org.uk/]  to this list. I am asking as a matter
of urgency (before 28th Nov) whether our community psychology network could
offer support and solidarity to SUG by endorsing the organisation (at the
very least) or coming up with a short statement of solidarity/support (at
the very most). SUG have a meeting with Prime Minister Gordon Brown next
week to put their case forward. To have a statement of support from a
collective of psychologists and users of psychological services might help
them.  Here are some of the aims of SUG:

SUG are seeking social justice through holding to account:

* GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) for criminal activities related to the withholding
of, on commercial grounds, clinical trial data that showed GSK's drug
Seroxat (an SSRI anti-depressant medication prescribed to people diagnosed
with, inter alia, depression, anxiety disorders and sexual dysfunction)
lacked efficacy and was unsafe

* GSK in particular and the pharmaceutical industry in general for the
social harm caused by the over-medicalisation of social problems and for
putting drug profit before public health

* the government for failing to implement the recommendations of the House
of Commons Health Committee Report into the Influence of the Pharmaceutical
Industry (2005). Among other things, the report recommended that the
pharmaceutical industry in the UK be more tightly regulated and to move
responsibility for representing and protecting the interests of the
pharmaceutical industry out of the Department of Health and into the
Department of Trade and Industry (at present the Dept of Health has the
responsibility both to protect public health AND protect/promote the
economic interests of the pharmaceutical industry).

* the medical and allied professions for not ensuring that their members are
adequately trained to ensure:
~ they recognise adverse drug reactions in patients;
~ properly judge clinical trial data on drug efficacy and safety so that
they are not duped by drug company marketing practices;
~ deal with drug company professionals in a way commensurate with
protecting public health
~ coroners are made aware and make use of clinical data that shows the risk
of death from taking SSRI medication.

SUG is simultaneously trying to offer support to all those who have been
harmed by taking SSRI medication. This includes, among other things,
providing information and advice on how to seek legal redress against the
pharmaceutical industry and on how to cope with and withdraw from SSRI
medication.

SUG is doing all of this on a budget of around £200 per year!

This network proved to be very keen in taking a stance against the use of
CBT. Has our network the courage to go much further than this and to be as
keen to support SUG's fight against the power and might of the
pharmaceutical industry? I hope so ...

The pharmaceutical industry knows how to play dirty and how to protect it's
corporate interests. Of course, that industry may be too powerful or we may
be too weak to offer any protection or support for SUG. I hope not....

p

Paul Duckett
Division of Psychology and Social Change
Manchester Metropolitan University
England
Phone +44 161 247 2552
Fax +44 161 247 6364
email: [log in to unmask]

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___________________________________
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For any problems or queries, contact the list moderator Rebekah Pratt on [log in to unmask] or Grant Jeffrey on [log in to unmask]