Re: Connecticut School shooting.
The effects of prescription drugs and their role in these events are blatantly apparent. This issue is nothing new.
August 1st, 1966, Charles Whitman stabbed his mother and his wife to death, then made his way to the 27th floor observation deck of the University of Texas Tower where he proceeded to kill 13 people and wound 32 others. With him in the tower were a machete, a 6mm Remington 700 ADL, an M1 carbine, a .35 cal Remington m141, a sawed-off 12 gauge, a .357mag S&W 19, a 9mm Luger P08, a .25cal Galesi-Brescia, and 700 rounds of ammunition.
Then Gov. John Connally commissioned a "task force" which determined Whitman's actions likely resulted from a congenital brain tumor and the use of prescription drugs including valium and dextroamphetamine, an antidepressant which was an early form of the ADHD drug Adderall. Whitman had complained of constant headaches and uncontrolled anger during visits with five different university doctors in the year leading up to the shootings including the university's staff psychiatrist, Dr. Maurice Dean Heatly.
From Dr. Heatly's notes during Whitman's visit on March 29, 1966, four months before the shooting...
Dr. Heatly-
"He readily admits having overwhelming periods of hostility with a very minimum of provocation. Repeated inquiries attempting to analyze his exact experiences were not too successful with the exception of his vivid reference to 'thinking about going up on the tower with a deer rifle and start shooting people'."
After the one session Whitman never returned to see Dr. Heatly again although he did comment on the meeting in his suicide note...
Whitman-
"I talked with a Doctor once for about two hours and tried to convey to him my fears that I felt some overwhelming violent impulses. After one visit, I never saw the Doctor again, and since then have been fighting my mental turmoil alone, and seemingly to no avail."
Any of this sound familiar?
Virtually all perpetrators of these mass shootings were on a form of prescribed antidepressant or psychostimulant medication which have a LONG history of documented side effects up to and including psychotic episodes. Prolonged use of these medications can cause amphetamine psychosis and even excited delirium characterized by a combination of anxiety, disorientation, delusions, hallucinations, violent and irratic behavior, elevated body temperature, and an insensitivity to pain. Many of these individuals had reached out to others, even professionals and expressed their suicidal and homicidal impulses.
Anybody want to guess why this information isn't pushed to the forefront of the conversation?
In 2011, the firearms industry generated approximately $31 billion. In contrast, big pharma generated close to $900 billion last year. With a commercial for a different medication on the TV every five minutes, which way do you suppose the media is going to swing when it comes time to point fingers?