FIRST, congratulations to the Irish Examiner’s Jennifer Hough for the excellent special investigation into the topsy-turvy world of mental health treatment in Ireland.

MORE than five million prescriptions for powerful drugs to treat depression, psychosis, anxiety or lack of sleep are being written every year, costing in excess of €110 million, official figures have revealed.

AT the end of 2009 1,478,560 people were entitled to hold a medical card.

MENTAL health practitioners are setting up a “database of safe psychiatrists” for people seeking therapeutic care rather than the mainstream model of medication and hospitalisation.

I LEAVE to others the argument over the propriety and constitutionality of Mr McDowell's action in handing part of a confidential garda file to his drinking buddy Sam Smyth and in making allegations against Mr Connolly behind the shield of Dáil privilege.