Psychiatric drugs bring their own ill-effects

YOUR correspondent John Murphy draws attention to how psychiatric drugs can result in nicotine dependency and how we need to address this serious health issue. (‘Doctors not taking responsibility for drugs,’ Irish Examiner letters, January 19).

Research has indicated that nicotine may offer temporary relief from the damaging effects of certain drug-disrupted neurotransmitter systems and may also induce metabolism of these drugs. In other words, it makes these psychiatric drugs slightly more tolerable. The health risks for the psychiatrically-labelled are therefore very high as a result of this lethal combination.

The truth needs to be spoken plainly here. Psychiatric drugs are not medicine; they are quite simply poison.