Nirvana for the drug industry is every human being on at least one prescription drug. That goal moves forward in California.
The drug company marionettes in the state Senate have launched the seventh attempt to enable psychologists to prescribe psychotropic drugs to their patients. Currently only psychiatrists and a few others such as nurse practitioners and physician assistants with special training in psychiatry are authorized to prescribe drugs. Psychologists, not being medical doctors, are not allowed under state law to write prescriptions for their patients. The senate bill will free them to write as many prescriptions as they see fit.
The article to which we link and which opposes relaxing the prescription rules begins amusingly enough by noting that enough psychotropic drugs are already prescribed to hand over a Xanax, Prozac, or Ritalin to every man, woman, and child in America. Will society benefit, asks the author, from a scheme that will increase the number of prescriptions written for these dangerous drugs? His answer is a firm "no" and he marshalls up an impressive array of reasons to kill this bill.
Cynics will scoff, noting that the author is himself a member of the priestly class of psychiatrists and certainly doesn’t wish to dilute the numinous aura that enfolds the medical profession. Quite true and we will note that the author’s dismay over the amount of drugs already prescribed to Americans rings a bit hollow since his profession has contributed so much to that saturation. That he is self-serving, however, doesn’t negate his concerns.
The doctor certainly is correct in predicting that under the California Senate bill to relax the requirements for prescribing psychotropic drugs more prescriptions will be written freely by people who do not have the training to deal with the myriad of conditions that occur whenever drugs are introduced into the bodies of human beings. The senate bill is a financial bonanza for the drug industry and should be tossed into the trash can.
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