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Unknown A
There are people who argue that SSRI antidepressants lead to mass shootings. One of those people seems to be Piers Morgan. Piers Morgan had this wacky panel that included Dr. Burke's. Remember Dr. Burke's from the COVID days. And Piers is jumping on the. There's a link here between the antidepressants and violent outbursts, mass shootings. This all seems to be couched in support of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. S conspiracy theories. Let's take a listen to it. Then we will discuss.
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Unknown B
America is ridiculously overmedicated, particularly in the area of antidepressant drugs and anxiety drugs and so on. And Britain is going the same way.
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Unknown A
No, I think it's great. I think it's great.
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Unknown B
There are millions. There are millions of young people. You know what happened. Hang on, Francesca, hang on. There's not shouting.
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Unknown A
Private life.
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Unknown B
Let me just finish. Let me put a question to you.
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Unknown A
Bet money the Francesca drugs right now.
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Unknown B
Let me put a question to you. Hang on, guys, hang on. Can you both please hang on.
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Unknown A
What happens is Francesca, people's medications away.
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Unknown B
Let me make a point, please.
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Unknown A
Hey, hey.
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Unknown B
Let me make my point. Let him respond.
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Unknown A
I feel like I'm.
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Unknown B
Can you everyone stop talking for a moment?
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Unknown A
I'm on a panel.
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Unknown B
Francesca. The point I'm making is America has 80% of the world painkiller consumption. 80%, right? You have millions of young.
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Unknown A
Now we're talking about painkillers.
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Unknown B
Respond. Yet millions of young people who are taking completely unnecessary mind bending drugs for things like anxiety, depression, often self diagnosed. And guess what happens? You then have a load of weirdo loner kids running around with their brain scrambled who commit mass shootings and stuff like that. There is a direct correlation and we're going the same way. In Britain, young people are getting massively overmedicated. So I am actually in favor of RFK trying to pull America away from its addiction to mind bending drugs.
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Unknown A
So of course the phrase mind bending is being selectively and pejoratively used. I prefer to just stick to what we know. The criticism from some has been SSRIs can cause or they can contribute to violent behavior. Some people on ssris, they get aggressive, they might self harm, they might harm others. Now what is that claim? Based on three different things. Number one, we have anecdotal reports. There are cases where an individual on an SSRI committed a violent act. That doesn't tell us anything about whether the SSRI caused it. But we have anecdotal reports. One of the things you have to consider is that if you have a large enough population, you know, it's sort of like saying, everybody, every mass shooter drank water, and at some point you got to go, well, what's the base rate? How many people are drinking water? Now, SSRIs are not like water, much to the.
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Unknown A
To the dismay of peers who says, everybody's on them. But SSRIS are widely enough prescribed that you're going to find people on SSRIS who have done all sorts of things. It's sort of like saying, hey, you know, how many. I don't even know how many people who are driving recklessly are on a cholesterol medication. And we would say, well, there's so many people on cholesterol medication. Is it really the medication? So we've got anecdotal reports, number two, we've got legal cases. There are lawsuits that allege the SSRI caused the violent behavior. As you all know, you can file a lawsuit saying anything. The fact that there are cases where that is asserted doesn't mean that it is true. Now, what do the studies say? This is what I care about. There are studies that have found, some studies that have found a correlation between SSRI use and increased aggression.
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Unknown A
Now, there's a few critical things to understand there. First of all, a correlation does not mean a causation. And I'll give you one possible interpretation of this. People who are prescribed SSRIs, the population of people on SSRIS, are more likely to have an underlying mental health condition because that's what's being treated. The population on SSRIS is more likely to have some combination of depression, anxiety, or a personality disorder that may independently explain the risk of violent behavior. In other words, the population on SSRIs might be more prone to violence regardless of whether they are on the ssri. It's sort of like the people that go to Harvard are really successful, but the people that get into Harvard are also really successful, even if they don't go. How much of it is about Harvard? How much of it is about the people that get in? I think it's a pretty good analogy, although I'm not equating Harvard and SSRI.
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Unknown A
When you look at RCTs, randomly controlled trials, they do not find evidence that SSRIs cause violence. Now, it is true that there are trials that have reported people on SSRIs on average are more agitated or might have suicidal ideation. That's a small subset of folks who get those as side effects from the ssri. Those are pretty rare. And also, just because you are agitated or are thinking about Suicide doesn't mean you're going to go out and commit mass shootings or violent acts. Now then, the third thing I think is important to consider is is there a biological plausibility? Serotonin is involved in regulating mood and impulse control and aggression. So you could make the biological argument. SSRIs, selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, they mess with serotonin, they could affect behavior. Sure. Plausible. The truth is that both low and high serotonin levels can be associated with aggression and the relationship is extraordinarily complex and we would not really be in a position to honestly make an assessment about that.
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Unknown A
So it's very important to understand the potential side effects of any medication you're taking. People should be monitored when they are on these medications, just like they should be for, for most things that you're on. Long term. People on cholesterol medication like me, I think it's every six months or 12, I get a liver function test. Great. We want to understand what are the potential side effects. We want to, we want to look at that. The benefit of SSRIs in treating depression and anxiety seems to outweigh the risks hugely. Assuming that they are being properly prescribed and monitored. And we still. This is a, this is a classic. SSRI is responsible for everything. The mass shootings, Alex Jones level stuff. We just don't have the evidence. And my opinion is we should be led by the evidence. Well, I wrote a book.
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Unknown C
After a long journey and a ton of work, I am really thrilled with how it turned out and I hope you'll read it. The book is called the Echo Machine and in a nutshell, it looks at how American politics got so broken, who has already figured out solutions and how we can try to fix it and stop the terror of Trump for the next four years. With Trump winning this election, the Echo Machine couldn't be more relevant. Not only a warning about how we got here, but also about what might be coming and how to prevent the worst outcomes. We've got to stay engaged. We need a plan. And that's what the book is about. There's a belief out there that unless you have corporate media behind you, you can't have a successful political book launch, that it's not possible. I think we can prove that wrong.
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Unknown C
Order the Echo Machine today at David pakman.com/echo on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Audible, Kindle, anywhere that books, e books and audio books are sold. You can also call any local bookstore and say, please order me the Echo Machine by David Pakman.
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Unknown A
Wherever you get the book, you'll get.
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Unknown C
The free preorder perks, including the signed book plate. Head to David pakman.com/free book stuff after ordering.