Press
Release
November
16, 2004
Patricia
Weathers, President, 845-677-8115
Sheila
Matthews, National Vice President 203-966-8419
Blue
Cross Issues Warnings to Doctors Prescribing Drugs with Suicide Links.
Will
Insurance Companies Continue to Deny Death Protections
for
Suicide Victims?
News
that Blue Cross Insurance are warning physicians to exercise care and caution
when prescribing antidepressants comes as no surprise in lieu of the recent
antidepressant crisis that has plagued America for so long now and has recently
come to a swift and direct result. Scrambling
for damage control is a normal response under the circumstances by insurance
companies nationwide. Blue Cross
simply follows suit. Their
actions should be viewed cautiously and with enough skepticism from those many
Americans left victimized and harmed by antidepressant use.
Many want to believe that insurance companies are operating in the best
interest and safety of the patient. Others
more attune to reality remain skeptical.
What truly motivates insurance companies to take this initiative in
warning doctors to be careful?
The
bottom line is that the FDA has issued Black Box Warnings on all highly
marketable Antidepressants after conducting a long investigation.
Even with insurmountable evidence to establish their link to suicide this
investigation dragged on. In a
twisted and at times almost unbelievable fashion, Congress themselves had to
step in to demand that the FDA disclose its data regarding certain drugs.
Frustrating, and at times even ludicrous, this investigation revealed not
only a clear definitive link to suicide by these drugs, but the FDA’s and drug
industries desperate attempts to hide, cover-up, conceal, distort (call it what
you may) clinical trial data.
In
light of all these facts, it is little wonder that insurance companies are
gearing up to minimize loss. Their
logic in warning doctors to err on the side of caution when prescribing
antidepressants is used in an attempt to save them billions in potential
lawsuits.
Take
for example, in the past, if a member of your family committed suicide and was
taking an antidepressant or withdrawing from an antidepressant, your legal
recourse, and protections under insurance is difficult at best and more often
than not, nonexistent. Now up the
stakes, by throwing the fact that these drugs have black box warnings on them,
clearly spelling out their potential for harm.
Insurance companies are between a rock and a hard place, under the gun to
justify not paying claims to potential victims of the antidepressant suicide
fallout.
An
industry that has previously been in the driver’s seat, one that ultimately
has had the final say in denying suicide victims claims, no longer has an
unobstructed path to tread down. It
treads today on shaky ground; no longer sure that denying death claims due to
suicide, when antidepressants are involved, is in its best interest.
Accountability
measures need to be enacted that would ensure that the families of victims of
this antidepressant suicide crisis receive immediate protection and justice in
the form of financial compensation.
Several
flaws in a questionable system stress the importance of accountability here
where it has been previously lacking. They
are as follows:
·
Proper
and full informed consent needs to be provided to the patient in writing prior
to any psychiatric “treatment”. This
entails revealing to the potential patient the risk of suicide when prescribing
an antidepressant.
·
Toxicity
testing on suicide victims is not mandated and needs to be required.
Victim’s families are not provided with the information on the
importance of toxicity screening and are not given the actual procedure on how
to request testing at the time of death.
·
Suicides
have been and are still routinely blamed on a person’s mental state or a
person’s psychiatric diagnosis, rather than on the psychiatric “treatment”
that the person had received prior to his death.
This occurs routinely without scientific backing or verification of it
being a fact. In this way, drug
harm, is often overlooked or disregarded.
·
Overall,
s
·
Under
“Right to Treatment”, insurance companies have been required to cover
dangerous and risky psychiatric “treatment” even when the diagnosis itself
does not withstand evidence-based criteria.
Simply put, a person is diagnosed with a psychiatric disorder based on
lists of subjective behaviors rather than on confirming, objective blood tests
or brain scans.
The
overall picture is one that shows the drug industry, and the psychiatric
Industry conveniently not being held accountable.
Both groups arm themselves with strong lobbying groups in Washington
whose sole purpose is to grease the palms of our political representatives.
In
the midst of all this confusion, insurance companies are left with half-hearted
attempts at restoring order in a disordered and chaotic system.
For
more information on the risks of suicide and antidepressants and the recent
“Black Box Warnings” on antidepressants, please visit us at www.ablechild.org.