Sedated: How Modern Capitalism Created our Mental Health Crisis

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Dr Davies said, “by sedating people to the causes and solutions for their socially rooted distress – both literally and ideologically – our mental health sector has stilled the impulse for social reform, which has distracted people from the real origins of their despair and has favoured results that are primarily economic while presiding over the worst outcomes in our health care system”. For most of our history we have needed to act in a cooperative manner to be a part of a society that evolved over a long period of time to an egalitarian way of thinking. But now things have changed. There is a significant link of this book has already pointed out that sometimes inequality is driving increased levels of mental health. This is the first book I've read that examines mental health in a sociopolitical context, and it was a breath of fresh air. Last year, I had a video appointment with my new primary care doctor because I was dealing with burnout and depression from severe job stress. Five minutes into the call, the doctor told me she would write me a prescription for antidepressants. I'd never met this doctor before, she didn't know anything about my life or the circumstances that led me to feel depressed and burned out—yet she was happy to give me a prescription for psychiatric drugs within minutes. Singapore committed to global efforts to prevent, counter radicalisation and violent extremism: FM Balakrishnan

Politics of Distress: A discussion with Dr. James Davies The Politics of Distress: A discussion with Dr. James Davies

Davies has used this book to describe the UK’s ‘marketised vision of mental health that has stripped our suffering of its deeper meaning and purpose’ (p.2). His arguments are evidenced by discussions of various research papers, by countless interviews he conducted and by his own attendance at events such as the Occupy movement in New York. https://www.roehampton.ac.uk/life-sciences/news/dr-james-davies-publishes-new-book-sedated-how-modern-capitalism-created-our-mental-health-crisis/ The author looks also at how in modern day Britain, where schools are are ranked by league tables and even parents are putting high levels of pressure on their own children to succeed and pass exams, is it any wonder that children are feeling high levels of anxiety and sadness. In countries such as Canada, where things are much more relaxed, there are far fewer children with so-called mental health problems. It doesn't help that many of these needs are created not just by governments alone, but also by many parents. However, another point in this book is that suffering can actually cause many good things to occur. Think of the civil rights movement which was built on the suffering people were experiencing. Also, many people's suffering such as a death of a partner or child that has an illness can help us to truly start to reevaluate what is truly important in our life. It shows the power of big pharma over various areas in the system and how this fundimentally creates a system leading to suffering being 'your own fault'. Rather than fewer workplace rights, fewer resources, fewer positive relationships etc... being the actual cause. It shows capitalism being a detriment to people's health, leading them to be mentally unwell and then the same system blaming them for it, because otherwise the system would have to admit to itself it doesn't care about people, just their productivity.

I was really excited to get into this one because the subject matter really intrigued me, but I was left feeling a little bit disappointed overall. The book that then looks at a type of treatment called APT which will help people in times of stress but when you look at the statistical outcomes they show the same amount of recovery as people who haven't had any treatment even though they seem to fiddle the numbers to say that they are been a success. The greatest number of people who are struggling are actually people who are practitioners of APT therapy. They are constantly in burnout mode. The book concludes that change is possible, so long as we identify and reform the real social drivers of our mental health crisis.

Sedated: How Modern Capitalism Created Our Mental Health Sedated: How Modern Capitalism Created Our Mental Health

Muchas personas toman antidepresivos por la simple razón de que hay poquísimas alternativas disponibles. Nuestros servicios públicos carecen de alternativas psicosociales, como la terapia, por lo que los fármacos se convierten en la intervención más rápida y barata (aunque menos eficaz) en salud mental".

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Crucial conversations: with Joanna Moncrieff and James Davies Crucial conversations: with Joanna Moncrieff and James Davies

this book is a solid three stars from me, at times veering closer toward the 2.5 mark, and at others closer to the 3.5 rating. i enjoyed a lot of the evidence quoted regarding the way mental health care has been commodified across a variety of care spheres, and was particularly interested in the way the education system has utilised diagnosis as a way to secure funding where the government has failed in supporting them. the focus upon the socio-cultural, economic, and political landscape which influences peoples' capacity for coping, and their reactions to widespread adversity, provided excellent commentary on mental health care under capitalism. the conclusion was by far and large one of my favourite parts of this book, where i feel it touched upon a lot of what i thought was missing from the rest of the book – particularly the nuance of mental health care and what it looks like moving forward. specific reference to the changed and irreversible landscape of mental health care post-covid was especially interesting and important. Pernah nggak, kepikiran kalau di balik kesehatan mental penyebabnya tidak lain & tidak bukan adalah kapitalisma? 👀 Sometimes mental health services focus too much on what is wrong with someone as opposed to what happened to someone. So for example if you have an increased workload and you're not sleeping and therefore this is bringing you down and you feel a lot of stress and pressure it is often the remit of professionals to say that that person is suffering from depression rather than from an increased workload that could be managed and sorted rather than trying to manage the label of depression. Many well-being courses that are supplied by companies such as the NHS have no evidence to show that they work in regards to reducing stress and depression. If you have an increased workload for example, you find your job boring and you might have some personal problems it is totally natural to feel some signs of depression or sadness in your life but perhaps managing what it is it's bothering you might be more important than just going on the well-being course where are you practising mindfulness techniques. As already pointed out, no research shows that these kinds of courses actually support and help people and make any changes to their well-being and mental health status.We are effectively encouraged to use material comforts to treat our distress. Buying something new, something better, will make you feel good. Eating, drinking, smoking, holidays or new clothes become crutches, but profitable for capitalism. At the same time, governments and authorities lecture people about taking personal responsibility for our health and consumer choices. This is a social catch-22, since we have not had governments with any interest in alleviating our distress. We are simply being seen as a source of profits when in distress. A social cure is needed The evidence behind this claim comes from research undertaken by Professor Martin Harrow and published in the Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease. Harrow’s research showed that many psychiatric drugs when taken long term harm the people they purported to help (p.44). Davies interviewed another researcher, Robert Whittaker, who having seen Harrow’s work engaged in a study to look at the effects of psychiatric drug use on many major mental illnesses. Whittaker showed that in aggregate people who continue to take psychiatric drugs do much worse in the long term than those who stop them (pp.49-50). He argues that our: ‘entire approach to mental health is preoccupied with sedating us, depoliticising our discontent and keeping us productive and subservient to the economic status quo’ (p.3). Dr James Davies graduated from the University of Oxford in 2006 with a PhD in social and medical anthropology. He is now a Reader in social anthropology and mental health at the University of Roehampton. James is also a psychotherapist, who started working for the NHS in 2004. He is the co-founder of the Council for Evidence-based Psychiatry (CEP), which is secretariat to the All Party Parliamentary Group for Prescribed Drug Dependence.