{"id":138716,"date":"2014-09-02T22:35:35","date_gmt":"2014-09-02T22:35:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/?p=138716"},"modified":"2014-09-02T22:35:35","modified_gmt":"2014-09-02T22:35:35","slug":"30-million-americans-antidepressants-21-facts-americas-endless-pharmaceutical-nightmare","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/editorials\/30-million-americans-antidepressants-21-facts-americas-endless-pharmaceutical-nightmare\/","title":{"rendered":"30 Million Americans On Antidepressants And 21 Other Facts About America\u2019s Endless Pharmaceutical Nightmare"},"content":{"rendered":"

Michael Snyder<\/em>
\nRINF Alternative News<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Has there ever been a nation more hooked on drugs than the United States? And I am not just talking about illegal drugs \u2014 the truth is that the number of Americans addicted to legal drugs is far greater than the number of Americans addicted to illegal drugs. As you will read about below, more than 30 million Americans are currently on antidepressants and doctors in the U.S. wrote more than 250 million prescriptions for painkillers last year. Sadly, most people got hooked on these drugs very innocently.<\/p>\n

They trusted that their doctors would never prescribe something for them that would be harmful, and they trusted that the federal government would never approve any drugs that were not safe. And once the drug companies get you hooked, they often have you for life. You see, the reality of the matter is that some of these \u201clegal drugs\u201d are actually some of the most addictive substances on the entire planet. And when they start raising the prices on those drugs, there isn\u2019t much that the addicts can do about it. It is a brutally efficient business model, and the pharmaceutical industry guards their territory fiercely. Very powerful people will often do some really crazy things when there are hundreds of billions of dollars at stake. The following are 22 facts about America\u2019s endless pharmaceutical nightmare that everyone should know\u2026<\/p>\n

#1<\/strong>\u00a0According to the New York Times,\u00a0more than 30 million Americans<\/a>\u00a0are currently taking antidepressants.<\/p>\n

#2<\/strong>\u00a0The rate of antidepressant use among middle aged women is far higher than for the population as a whole. At this point,\u00a0one out of every four women in their 40s and 50s<\/a>\u00a0is taking an antidepressant medication.<\/p>\n

#3<\/strong>\u00a0Americans account for about five percent of the global population, but we buymore than 50 percent<\/a>\u00a0of the pharmaceutical drugs.<\/p>\n

#4<\/strong>\u00a0Americans also consume a whopping\u00a080 percent<\/a>\u00a0of all prescription painkillers.<\/p>\n

#5<\/strong>\u00a0It is hard to believe, but doctors in the United States write\u00a0259 million prescriptions<\/a>\u00a0for painkillers each year. Prescription painkillers are some of the most addictive legal drugs, and our doctors are serving as enablers for millions up0n millions of Americans that find themselves hooked on drugs that they cannot kick.<\/p>\n

#6<\/strong>\u00a0Overall, pharmaceutical drug use in America is at an all-time high. According to a study conducted by the Mayo Clinic, nearly\u00a070 percent<\/a>\u00a0of all Americans are on at least one prescription drug, and 20 percent of all Americans are on at least five prescription drugs.<\/p>\n

#7<\/strong>\u00a0According to the CDC, approximately\u00a09 out of every 10<\/a>\u00a0Americans that are at least 60 years old say that they have taken at least one prescription drug within the last month.<\/p>\n

#8<\/strong>\u00a0In 2010, the average teen in the United States was taking\u00a01.2 central nervous system drugs<\/a>. Those are the kinds of drugs which treat conditions such as ADHD and depression.<\/p>\n

#9<\/strong>\u00a0A very disturbing Government Accountability Office report found thatapproximately one-third<\/a>\u00a0of all foster children in the United States are on at least one psychiatric drug.<\/p>\n

#10<\/strong>\u00a0An astounding\u00a095 percent<\/a>\u00a0of the \u201cexperimental medicines\u201d that the pharmaceutical industry produces are found not to be safe and are never approved. Of the remaining 5 percent that are approved, we often do not find out that they are deadly to us until decades later.<\/p>\n

#11<\/strong>\u00a0One study discovered that mothers that took antidepressants during pregnancy were\u00a0four times more likely<\/a>\u00a0to have a baby that developed an autism spectrum disorder.<\/p>\n

#12<\/strong>\u00a0It has been estimated that prescription drugs kill\u00a0approximately 200,000 people<\/a>\u00a0in the United States every single year.<\/p>\n

#13<\/strong>\u00a0An American dies from an unintentional prescription drug overdose\u00a0every 19 minutes<\/a>. According to\u00a0Dr. Sanjay Gupta<\/a>, accidental prescription drug overdose is \u201cthe leading cause of acute preventable death for Americans\u201d.<\/p>\n

#14<\/strong>\u00a0In the United States today, prescription painkillers kill more Americans\u00a0than heroin and cocaine combined<\/a>.<\/p>\n

#15<\/strong>\u00a0According to the CDC,\u00a0approximately three quarters of a million people a year<\/a>\u00a0are rushed to emergency rooms in the United States\u00a0because of adverse reactions to pharmaceutical drugs.<\/p>\n

#16<\/strong>\u00a0The number of prescription drug overdose deaths in the United States isfive times higher<\/a>\u00a0than it was back in 1980.<\/p>\n

#17<\/strong>\u00a0A survey conducted for the National Institute on Drug Abuse found that more than\u00a015 percent<\/a>\u00a0of all U.S. high school seniors\u00a0abuse prescription drugs.<\/p>\n

#18<\/strong>\u00a0More than 26 million women over the age of 25 say that they are \u201cusing prescription medications for unintended uses<\/a>\u201c.<\/p>\n

#19<\/strong>\u00a0If all of these antidepressants are helping, then why are more Americans killing themselves? The suicide rate for Americans between the ages of 35 and 64 increased\u00a0by nearly 30 percent<\/a>\u00a0between 1999 and 2010. The number of Americans that die by suicide is now greater than the number of Americans that die as a result of car accidents every year.<\/p>\n

#20<\/strong>\u00a0Antidepressant use has been linked to mass shootings in America\u00a0over and over and over again<\/a>, and yet the mainstream media is eerily quiet about this. Is it because they don\u2019t want to threaten one of their greatest sources of advertising revenue?<\/p>\n

#21<\/strong>\u00a0The amount of money that the pharmaceutical industry is raking in is astronomical. It has been reported that Americans spent\u00a0more than 280 billion dollars<\/a>\u00a0on prescription drugs during 2013.<\/p>\n

If many of these drugs were not so addictive, the pharmaceutical companies would make a lot less money. And pharmaceutical drug addicts often don\u2019t fit the profile of what we think a \u201cdrug addict\u201d would look like. For example,\u00a0CNN<\/a>shared the story of a 55-year-old grandmother named Cynthia Scudo that become addicted to prescription painkillers\u2026<\/p>\n

For Scudo, her addiction began \u2013 as they all do \u2013 innocently enough.<\/p>\n

She sought relief from hip pain, possibly caused by scarring from cesarean sections she had delivering several of her children.<\/p>\n

Her then-husband recommended a physician.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere was no physical therapy offered,\u201d she said of the doctor\u2019s visit. \u201cThe first reaction was, let\u2019s give you some drugs.\u201d<\/p>\n

He put her on OxyContin.<\/p>\n

By the second week, she was physically addicted.<\/p>\n

She was popping so much of the painkiller and other drugs such as anti-anxiety Valium that they equated to a dosage for three men.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

There is lots and lots of money to be made from addiction. In fact, if the U.S. health care system was a totally separate nation it would actually be\u00a0the 6th largest economy<\/a>\u00a0on the entire globe. We are talking about piles of money larger than most people would ever dare to imagine.<\/p>\n

And with so much money floating around, it is quite easy for the pharmaceutical industry to buy the cooperation of our politicians and of the media.<\/p>\n

Some time when you are watching television in the evening, consciously take note of how often a pharmaceutical commercial comes on.<\/p>\n

It has gotten to the point where we are literally being inundated with these ads.<\/p>\n

They are already making hundreds of billions of dollars, and they think that there is room for even more growth.<\/p>\n

Will they ever be satisfied?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Michael Snyder RINF Alternative News Has there ever been a nation more hooked on drugs than the United States? And I am not just talking about illegal drugs \u2014 the truth is that the number of Americans addicted to legal drugs is far greater than the number of Americans addicted to illegal drugs. As you […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1216,"featured_media":6493,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[461],"tags":[736,762,763],"class_list":{"0":"post-138716","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-editorials","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-antidepressants","10":"tag-pharmaceuticals"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138716","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1216"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=138716"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138716\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6493"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=138716"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=138716"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=138716"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}