CCHR says an investigation of this link should not be limited to those committing suicide by drug overdose but also determine whether those killing themselves by gunshot, hanging or by other methods were taking or withdrawing from psychotropic drugs at the time. It should be a focal part of the Veterans Affairs commitment of more than $186 million in 2018 to prevent suicide, CCHR adds.
Earlier this year, the Pentagon reported that 265 active-duty service members killed themselves in 2015, continuing a trend of unusually high suicide rates that have plagued the U.S. military for at least seven years, according to USA Today. The number of suicides among troops was 145 in 2001 and began a steady increase until more than doubling to 321 in 2012.[1]
Suicide—not combat—is the leading killer of U.S. troops deployed to the Middle East to fight Islamic State militants, the Pentagon statistics showed.[2]
But according to CCHR and experts working with it, there are serious concerns about the relationship between military/veteran suicides and the increase of psychotropic drug prescriptions. According to Dr. Bart Billings, a retired Colonel and Medical Service Corps Officer in the U.S. Army, a surge of prescriptions since 2005 "coincides with the gradual increase, to this day, of suicides in the military. I feel there's a direct relationship," Billings told CNS News.[3]
In 2014, CCHR presented evidence of this to the U.S. Senate's Veteran Affairs Committee calling, then, for an inquiry into the potential violence- and suicide-inducing effects of prescribed psychiatric drugs.
That submission reported:
92.8 percent of the Service Members who committed suicide were male, with 39.6 percent aged between 17 and 24.
Antidepressants prescribed Service Members and veterans carry a Food and Drug Administration (FDA) "black-box" warning of "suicidality" for those younger than 25.[6]
Further, an average of 20 veterans a day committed suicide in 2014.[7]
In October 2016, The Pharmaceutical Journal reported that even healthy adults who are taking certain antidepressants have a higher risk of suicidal thoughts and violent behavior, according to the results of a systematic review. "While it is now generally accepted that antidepressants increase the risk of suicide and violence in children and adolescents (although many psychiatrists still deny this), most people believe that these drugs are not dangerous for adults. This is a potentially lethal misconception," warned the researchers, based at the Nordic Cochrane Centre and the University of Copenhagen in Denmark.[9]
Writing in the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, the team said: "We found that antidepressants double the risk of suicidality and violence, and it is particularly interesting that the volunteers in the studies we reviewed were healthy adults with no signs of a mental disorder." The researchers say their results suggest that it is likely that antidepressants increase the number of suicides in people of all ages.[10]
On May 25, 2017, Rep. Mike Coffman (R-CO-6) introduced H.R.2652, theVeteran Overmedication Prevention Act of 2017 into Congress.[11] Thiscalls for a thorough and independent review of all suicides, violent deaths, and accidental deaths during a five-year period among veterans who received treatment furnished by the Department of Veteran Affairs during the five years leading up to their deaths. The review would be done by the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine under an agreement with the VA.[12]
CCHR says the legislation is a step in the right direction but points to the Department of Veterans Affairs saying it will increase spending on suicide prevention efforts by 7.5 percent to $186.1 million in 2018. And although a VA spokeswoman Gina Jackson calls this its "highest clinical priority,"[13] CCHR says that spending on and use of psychotropic drugs that may be driving veterans to suicide must be part of that priority.
Add to this, Friedhelm Sandbrink, M.D., the VA's Acting National Program Director for Pain Management, reported that up to 75 percent of older veterans experience chronic pain. Such pain may be treated with opioids which carry a risk for overuse or misuse. Complicating matters is additional psychotropic drugs being prescribed with opioids.[14] Cocktails of opioids and benzodiazepines, for example, can be lethal. On August 31, 2016, the FDA announced that it was requiring changes to drug labeling, including patient information, to warn of the serious risks associated with the combined use of certain opioids and benzodiazepines. Risks include extreme sleepiness, respiratory depression, coma and death. "It is nothing short of a public health crisis when you see a substantial increase of avoidable overdose and death related to two widely used drug classes being taken together," said FDA Commissioner Robert Califf, M.D.[15]
CCHR International has presented annual Human Rights Awards to individuals and families fighting for better treatment and care for military members and veterans—free of the influence of potentially harmful psychotropic drugs and cocktails of drugs. An example of the Award Winners is:
CCHR encourages anyone whose family member is in the military, or who is a veteran, to consult a medical doctor if there are concerns about psychotropic prescription practices and also report any abuse to CCHR.As a nonprofit, CCHR relies on memberships and donations to carry out its mission and actions to educate others about psychotropic drug use. It produced a public benefit documentary for the Armed Forces, veterans and families, The Hidden Enemy.
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