Dr. Breggin interviewed by Michael Savage

Q
Years ago Dr. Breggin who is psychiatrist was on this program warning America about the dangers of over diagnosis of ADD and ADHD and particularly the drugging of our children with Ritalin today. So, Dr. Breggin, do you know much about this “new epidemic” of newly-diagnosed number of people with autism?

A
Oh, I think it is a continuing marketing effort… The drug companies have really saturated America with drugs so they are constantly pushing to expand the diagnosis. They have tried everything from advocating drugging of sub-clinical conditions, that is conditions that don’t even meet the regular clinic requirements to using all of the adult drugs with children which is a disaster, and spreading it so so-called bipolar disorder or manic depressive disorder in children which I have never seen except when it is CAUSED by psychiatric drugs; and finally this broadening of this concept of autism, to “autism spectrum disorders”. Almost all the experts who are involved in this spreading of diagnostic categories are in the pay of the drug companies.

Q
Unbelievable how right I was. You know, it’s been really hard for the past few days for being attacked for telling the truth. We had an expert on yesterday, Dr. Camarata, who is an autism expert and treats it, and he actually said that about 58% of the cases, are falsely- or mis-diagnosed. Even he admits that. You go a step further. What percent would you say are not autistic?

A
Well, I think that diagnosis do more harm than good in general! I avoid diagnosing children with psychiatric disorders because it labels them, puts them into boxes, encourages the use of psychiatric drugs. I am trying to understand what is happening in the child’s life. And a lot of children who are labeled autistic are simply greatly in need of socialization, of a lot more attention, from parents, from teachers, from counselors.
So as far as I am concerned it is not a good idea to go around diagnosing kids, never a good idea to go about drugging them. Now we of course have the reality of children who at an early age fail to relate in a normal fashion to their moms and dads and the people around them. Most of these children, if you look at them, and watch them behaving, they actually don’t relate to people as if they are people!

Q
First of all, Dr. Breggin, you are a psychiatrist, I want the audience to know you are of the background is that correct?

A
I am a psychiatrist. I went to Howard College; some of training was at th e Howard Psychiatric Residency program and then I spent two years after I finished my full psychiatric training to years at the National Institute of Mental Health. I’ve published about 20 books and about 30 or 40 (I lost count) scientific articles so I am right in the mist….

Q
You are one of my heroes because you dear speak out against the guilds that are so awfully powerful. Two weeks ago, Dr. Breggin, I could not believe what I saw, the so-called American Academy of Pediatrics had the audacity to come out and say that the children as young as two years of age, should be given adult anti-cholesterol drugs. Without a single scientific study having been done, on the possible negative effects of such drugs on the child’s liver, muscles, etc. You know what I know, it’s because they were paid by the drug companies to do this; directly or indirectly through grants. Would you agree with the statement I just made?

A
Yes. What you find with the so-called “experts” in these areas that have anything to do with drugs, you’ll find that all of them, virtually all, are involved with the drug companies: getting research money, some of them have paid professorships by the drug companies, or they are working in bolding or the medical school built by the drug companies, or they are doing consultantships or seminars with the drug companies, or they are publishing papers written by the drug companies. We just had a scandal about a guy name Peterman in Howard, who did more than others to try to justify drugging of the children in America, it turns out that he’s been hiding just how deep his connections are. In fact I blew whistle on him in my new book “Medication Madness” and now the whistling is even louder since the book’s been published a couple of weeks ago.

Q
He should go prison as far as I am concerned. Anyone who treats children this way or mistreats them rather, under the guise of being their protectors, are masters of decrepit who should be put in prison. On the autism situation, you agree that true autism exists. Correct or incorrect?

A
There is now doubt that there is a picture that develops in some children that they have a terrible time relating to other human beings and it can be very lasting, especially if it isn’t handled properly. And the way to handle it, almost all genuine autism advocates talk about it is with a cycle of social and educational means nurturing and encouraging the child’s capacity to learn and to relate to other kids. But is is not proven biological.

Q
Isn’t it true that what I read of Albert Einstein when he was a very young child, he was a silent child, he stared off in the space, he wouldn’t talk to teacher, and the fact that the teacher would yell at him… I read this, I don’t know if it’s corroborated, that they shook him to get him to talk because he was considered somewhat off base. By today’s definition wouldn’t Einstein have been declared autistic?

A
He would have certainly been put in the spectrum disorder. Not autistic probably but in the spectrum disorder. Absolutely! He was very slow, He was not very skilled socially… and it was very noticeable when he was young.

Q
Is it true that they’ve developed pharmaceuticals to give to these poor children today that don’t really work?

A
They have now approved the most deadly of all drugs in the psychiatric arsenal to give to the autistic kids who are “very irritable”.

Q
And what drug is that?

A
Risperidone, which is an anti-psychotic developed on the basis of subduing state mental hospital patients.

Q
Oh my God, no!

A
Yes!. I do a lot of medical legal work; I do a lot of consultations, with injured patients… This happened in October 2006, I have already seen two or three dozen children with permanent neurological diseases cause by Risperidone. In particular, a disease called Tardive Dyskinesia which is deterioration in the motor control and in some cases in the mental centers of the brain that produces abnormal twitches, blinking, spasms; it will affect the way the child walks, stands, sits, and can be very deforming. And you can just imagine what it does to a child socially, this are very deadly drugs. In fact the drug company that makes a very similar drug Zyprexa, which is Eli Lilly, now settled for over a billion dollars of case just in diabetes caused by these types of drugs. Medical child abuse. They have a handout where they go against all sanity and in autism research and treatment and they talk about using drugs like Risperidone for behavioral problems in children.

Q
Now if you go on the internet and do a search on Risperidone, listen to what the side ads say: “Help for Mode Swings”, “Do You Have Bipolar?”… And these are medical groups, hospitals, psychiatric groups trying to invite people to come and to be diagnosed bipolar or whatever they want to be called. Is this not a business today, Dr. Breggin?

A
It is a horrible, unethical business. When I was in my psychiatric training, my entire training I saw 2 or 3 manic patients. People who are so out of control that you say, “That’ s bipolar”. Now every doctor has 10 or 15 or 20 in his practice. And it is all, almost all being caused by antidepressants, which commonly drive people into mania. So it is a business that actually supports itself. First you give the child Ritalin, then the child can’t sleep, so you give him a sedative, then the child gets sad from all the combination of drugs you are giving him and then you give them antidepressant; and that drives them into mania and you tell the parent he’s got the bipolar desorder and so help me God, I see this again and again in my practice.

Q
I guess you’d agree that the common sense have gone out of American social community!

A
Michael, you are pointing out a crisis in America with the diagnosing and drugging of our children and I wish the people who are attacking you would instead defend their children from psychiatric child abuse.