Prozac, flouxetine, frightening side-effects including psychotic violence and murder

		Prozac Information Sheet #1 Psychotic Violence

Prozac is a comparatively new drug which was approved by the FDA in December 1987. While Prozac has been promoted as having few side effects, reports which have been surfacing paint a different picture of this drug.

Even the manufacturer admits that Prozac can cause agitation, hostility, psychosis, and other frightening side effects including a little-known side effect called "akathisia."

The manufacturer's warning for Prozac states under Adverse Reactions:

"Nervous System - frequent: abnormal dreams and agitation; - infrequent: abnormal gait, acute brain syndrome, akathisia, amnesia, apathy, ... delusions, depersonalization, euphoria, hallucinations, hostility, ... manic reaction, paranoid reaction, psychosis, and vertigo; rare: abnormal electroencephalogram, anti-social reaction, chronic brain syndrome .... hysteria..."

According to the medical literature, the side effect of "akathisia" is a drug-induced insanity with bizarre and
frightening characteristics including hallucinations, aggression, self-destructive outbursts, terror, anger, hostility, hatred, and rage. (Ref: Theodore Van Putten, "The Many Faces of Akathisia.", Comprehensive Psychiatry, Volume 16, No. 1, January/February, 1975.)

Anyone who is taking Prozac needs to be informed that aggression and violence are possible results of using the drug. Persons on the drug can begin experiencing increased hostility toward people around them, and can even physically attack others, and might come to think that they are going insane, or their marriage has "gone bad" or any of a hundred other false reasons.

Extreme psychotic rampages of violence are even possible on this drug. On September 14, 1989, in Louisville, Kentucky, when Joseph Wesbecker killed eight people, wounded twelve others and then shot himself, he had a high therapeutic level of Prozac in his blood.

The president of CCHR testified at Wesbecker's inquest that Wesbecker had been turned into a killer by the mind-altering drugs he was taking, and the jury subsequently ruled that these drugs could well have contributed to Wesbecker's violence.

Also at the inquest, Wesbecker co-worker James Lucas confirmed that he, too, had become violent following use of Prozac. Lucas testified that he had never so much as raised his hand to his wife or children during 33 years of marriage, yet after using Prozac he had attacked his wife, trying to stab her.

Some of the side effects which the manufacturer cites for Prozac include dystonia and torticollis, and the Food and Drug Administration has received reports that tardive dyskinesia has occurred. with use of the drug. These are extremely serious, potentially permanent nerve disorders which cause the muscles of the face, neck, and other parts of the body to contract and spasm randomly and completely outside of the individual's control. The back wards of many institutions are littered with people who are unable to go out into public due to these disfiguring conditions.

These side effects are usually associated with the "anti-psychotic" drugs, and according to medical reports will occur in up to half of the people who take drugs in the anti-psychotic group. While Prozac is a new formulation which is
reportedly unlike the anti-psychotics, these side effects can and do occur on this drug.

Like all other psychiatric drugs, Prozac is designed to suppress symptoms for which psychiatrists do not know the cause. It appears to be the drug companies' and the psychiatrists' hope that people taking their drugs will find it necessary to take the drugs for a lifetime. However, whatever the reason, psychiatrists have a poor record of finding and correcting the underlying problems which give rise to mental symptoms.

Persons who have been told to take Prozac should seek out competent non-psyphiatric health care from a physician who can find out what the cause of the problem is and can fix that problem. As psychiatric drugs do not "cure" anything, this approach will not include the use of these drugs.

This information was originally printed and distributed as a public service by the Citizens Commission on Human Rights (CCHR), Clearwater, Florida. CCHR has been investigating and exposing psychiatric violations of human rights since 1969.

Prozac Information Sheet #1 Psychotic Violence

Suggested Reading:

Prozac Information Sheet #1
Psychotic Violence