Anti-Psychiatry Exhibit On Display

The Auckland-based Citizens Commission on Human Rights are showing their "Psychiatry: An Industry of Death" exhibit over the next two weeks in Auckland City.

The 2-metre high and 40-metre long exhibition is being shown at the AUT's Gallery 3, corner of Symonds and Mount streets, until April 14.

New Zealand is ranked amongst the highest nations for administering psychiatic drugs to children and young people, despite opposition to this practice, including some drug regulatory bodies.

Children and teenagers are prescribed medication for various learning disorders and psychiatric ills and now it is the medication that is the real problem claims the Commission.

In their documentary-style exhibition the Citizens Commission on Human Rights display the brutal history of psychiatry in series of panels and videos documenting a century of human rights abuses around the world. The video is so shocking the censor gave it an R-18 certificate.

CCHR's director, Mr Steve Green says the psychiatric abuse of human rights is worst when it is directed at children and young people.

“A major focus of the Commission's work today is against the drugging of children and young people. In this country the use of anti-depressants for teenagers is very controversial right now with claims of how they cause suicidal behaviour,” he said.

New Zealand's drug regulatory body, Medsafe, has issued advice to doctors about giving antidressants to anyone under the age of 18 indicating possible increased suicide risk and other severe side-effects and the need to closely monitor patients with depression. Despite these warnings there are still some psychiatrists who do give young people antidepressants. Pharmac figures show that in 2007/08 14,733 antidepressant prescriptions were given to children and young people aged from 6 to 18 years, while another 72 prescriptions were given to children 5 and under.

The panels in the display dispel the idea that mental illness comes from imbalances of brain chemicals. The Commission says the unscientific claims of chemical imbalances has lead to false hope with the widespread use of psychiatric drugs and nothing more than marketing.

“The exhibit highlights the absolute need to reform key areas of mental health treatment,” says Mr Green. Child drugging is but one of them. The continued use of electroshock treatment is a concern he said along with the use of restraints and seclusion which are seen as a kind of punishment. "What is needed are humane treatments that do not brutalise and harm patients,"

The New Zealand branch of the Citizens Commission on Human Rights has been the most vocal campaigner against psychiatric abuse in this country. In 1977 they exposed the child abuse and alleged torture of young people in Lake Alice psychiatric hospital which has now culminated in the Government paying out $11 million in compensation to 200 of the victims. Criminal complaints have also been laid against the principal psychiatrist in charge of the Child Unit and staff, which the Police are still investigating.

Other hospitals and controversial treatments have also been criticised by the Commission. They were instrumental in exposing the experimental use of Deep Sleep treatment around the country and the use of electro luekotomies on women in Nelson in the 1950s.

WHEN: Now until April 14
WHERE: Gallery 3, Cnr Symonds St and Mount St.

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