Now that RFK JR is the confirmed Secretary of Health and Human Services, there is a White House EO on a “MAHA” commission. I want to highlight just one section:
(iii) assess the prevalence of and threat posed by the prescription of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, antipsychotics, mood stabilizers, stimulants, and weight-loss drugs;
I am not a doctor. I am not a mental health professional. I am someone who has seen dramatic changes and improvements in the lives of people I deeply care for due to drugs that tweak their brain chemistry. And those improvements have happened within weeks of initiation.
I would strongly tell those people that I deeply care about to see if and how they can get much longer prescriptions to stockpile as much as possible as it will likely be the federal government’s policy that their mental health problems are all in their head and a function of individual failure that can be treated with money and woo at some point in the next few years.
Liminal Owl
On it. Thank you, David.
Unfortunately, most of my clients won’t have any way to stockpile. For a few of them, it could be catastrophic.
MomSense
@Liminal Owl:
This is terrifying. I think they want us to die.
BritinChicago
David, I want to express my appreciation not only for this post but for all your posts. I’m glad you’re posting more frequently now (and always read what you write).
Ohio Mom
There’s some overlap among those drugs, at Ohio Son’s doctors, they have began prescribing weight loss drugs to those gaining too much weight from antipsychotics.
Not a good statistical sampling but some days I think that every other person I know takes an SSRI. I’m trying to imagine a world filled with easily angered, grumpy, depressed people and off-the-charts road rage, among other things.
Anyway, the prevalence and “threats posed by” psychotropic meds is well studied. I guess theses fools never heard of medical science and research.
I keep thinking, isn’t big pharma going to be pissed at this potential cut into their revenue streams?
Ohio Mom
Also, at least for stimulants, I’m pretty sure you can’t stockpile them, they are a controlled substance.
brendancalling
I have 90 days of my MH meds. Gonna ask for more next week when I see my doc.
KayInMD (formerly Kay (not the front-pager))
Glp1 drugs have been indicated as beneficial not only for diabetes and weight loss, but for heart disease and in preventing/reducing dementia, among other things (they really do seem to be a miracle drug). My husband has diabetes, heart disease, and is in early Alzheimer’s, and I was planning to talk to his doctor next month about starting him on a glp1 drug as part of his treatment plan. I hope next month is not too late.
lowtechcyclist
Thanks for the alert, David. Let’s just say that someone near and dear to me has just emailed her doc about this.
Another Scott
Ken White (Popehat) noted this news as well. (He’s been quite public with his mental health history, and a good advocate for sensible care and understanding, over the years.)
Grr…
Thanks.
Best wishes,
Scott.
David Anderson
@BritinChicago: I want to write long and boring technocratic pieces again —- but that won’t be happening for a while.
I actually need to write a piece on where I think the administration wants to take the ACA individual market (TLDR — center/prioritize the unsubsidized vs the subsidized )
Ohio Mom
@David Anderson: Is that going to push a lot of subsidized people into the unsubsidized group? Rearranging the deck chairs? (These are wild, uneducated guesses).
I work on the assumption that the goal is managed care for everyone, lots of skimming off the top that way, like there is in Medicare Advantage.
bluefoot
What do they think the FDA does and what post-marketing surveillance is for? not to mention ongoing meta-analysis of published data.
That’s a rhetorical question. This is all just a way to implement imposing their favorite destructive hobbyhorses on the country.
BritinChicago
@David Anderson: Thanks. It would certainly be a public service to make more information easily available about the ACA—and what changes are proposed or are likely, and what effect those changes will have. Because many people who use it receive subsidies, it is presumably extremely vulnerable.
Soprano2
@Ohio Mom: If I weren’t taking generic Prozac right now I think I would have a meltdown every other day. For me I think it’s temporary, a way to stop having panic attacks every month.
columbusqueen
Christ. I have a five generation history of depression in my family, & have dealt with it since I was eleven. My antidepressant is imy best friend. But these fools want to cut my supply off. I hope they all rot in hell.
Ohio Mom
@Soprano2: And that’s great. You are in a tremendously stressful patch of life. Just be careful when it comes time to taper off, that has to be done very slowly and carefully.
Ohio Mom
@columbusqueen: Do you live in Columbus, Ohio? I have been mulling an all-Ohio meet-up and it would be helpful to have a Columbus point person, mainly to help identify a meeting place.
Anonymous at Work
I can imagine there being behind nfluenc on the VA formulary lists, but can HHS actually dictate anything to the VA system?
beckya57
I am a psychiatric provider (ARNP), and this definitely caught my attention (I saw it yesterday). As someone pointed out already, there’s limits on stockpiling stimulants. There’s also concerns about suicidal patients stockpiling meds; it’s standard practice to give some patients only a week’s supply at a time, to minimize overdose risks (most MH meds have relatively low risks, but there’s a few, eg lithium and tricyclic antidepressants, that can be dangerous in an overdose). So while stockpiling is good advice for some people, that’s not an answer for many patients. I’m not usually a fan of Big Pharma, but these meds do make them a lot of money, so I’m hoping they will push back hard on this.
columbusqueen
@Ohio Mom: Yes, I am. I have ideas for several possibilities for a place to meet. Feel free to e mail me, rlh_na at hotmail.com.
DaBunny
Is there any way to stockpile stimulants? Two members of my family rely on them, and being unable to obtain them would be crushing.
Liminal Owl
@MomSense: I think so too, and I’m so sorry. To your family and to everyone here (and elsewhere) who needs those meds—which, yes, have been studied extensively, not that the science-deniers cae—this is dreadful and disgusting.
Liminal Owl
@beckya57: Best wishes to you, and I don’t know what to say. Except: Can anyone help me understand why Big Pharma and the AMA seem to have rolled over and played dead, when they should have been fighting with all their power to keep RFKjr out of the government?
Percysowner
@Ohio Mom: Also, Xanax and its generics. I have to go see my doctor every 3 months to get a refill and they only dispense 30 days at a time. I have, in fact, stockpiled by virtue of the fact that I only use them under extreme stress and to help me fall asleep at night, so I never quite used up the batch when refill time came up. I would just wait until I was getting close to needing a refill and then contact my doctor. From here on out, when the pharmacy tells me I can refill, I will refill, no matter how many I have on hand. For one thing the moments of extreme stress and the need for using them has gone up in recent weeks.
Redshift
Unfortunately, a feature of our healthcare system is that for the most part you can’t stockpile more than 90 days of prescription medications unless you’re independently wealthy. Ms. Redshift has had times when we were going out of the country for a couple of weeks three days before a refill date, and it was “nope, insurance won’t pay, you’ll have to wait.” (So of course a 90-day prescription doesn’t mean you have a 90 day supply, it means you have at most a 90 day supply, and at minimum a few days.)
Steve LaBonne
My wife functions, largely free from agoraphobia and associated panic attacks for many years now, thanks to paroxetine plus more recently a low dose of venlafaxine. If RFK wants to acquire a Guido, this is the way.
Redshift
@bluefoot:
Power over our health care system is now in the hands of the “do your own research” crowd – they believe “researching” by looking at what some guy on the internet says is more trustworthy than facts and data.
Ohio Mom
@columbusqueen: Thanks!
TONYG
I know that certain mental health drugs are impossible to stockpile. They are restricted from being refilled until they run out. These freaks just want to see people It’s thst simple
Quicksand
@Steve LaBonne: I think you’re thinking of Mario.
Steve LaBonne
@Quicksand: Luigi. Damn, my brain is shot without any pharmaceutical help.
dlwchico
And I just started taking Wellbutrin like a week ago.
gene108
There’s been so much done to make seeking mental health treatment acceptable over the last 25 years, I thought we’d turned a corner.
They really want to destroy social progress in every area imaginable.
Citizen Alan
@dlwchico: Wellbutrin changed my life. I distinctly remember an occasion about a month after I started on it when I stopped to admire a sunset, and I suddenly realized it was the first time in my life that I could recall when I noticed natural beauty.
TONYG
@TONYG: want yo see people suffer …
arrieve
@Citizen Alan:
From the comments here, I think a lot us can relate to this. When I started on my first antidepressant in the 1980’s I didn’t expect it to work. And a few weeks into taking it, I was waiting at a bus stop on a steamy hot day and thinking about September and a class I was going to be taking. And I realized I was looking forward to something.
I have been on generic Zoloft for more than 25 years now, and am grateful every day for the relatively normal life it has granted me, (mostly) free of the anxiety and daily panic attacks.
TONYG
Below the surface, “wellness gurus” have deep contrmpt for people
tjmn
Fuck them all to hell. My son has Asperger’s with suicidal depression if he does not get his daily meds. It is not fucking all in his head. Motherfuckers.
chopper
i assume they’ll reveal that people with schizophrenia spectrum disorders are better served by drinking kale smoothies or some such
Andrya
My SIL, who is also one of my closest friends, has schizophrenia, totally controlled by antipsychotic medication. She’s also very active in NAMI (National Association for the Mentally Ill). NAMI needs to get on this immediately and urgently. If any other Jackals have any contacts with NAMI, please bring this to their attention.
While working as a community college math teacher, I have had a number of experiences where a student who was doing A level work fell apart during the semester and suddenly was failing the class. In a large majority of such cases, the student was on mental health medications, but had stopped taking them due to family pressure. (Family saying stuff like “Medication is for weaklings! Overcome your illness with will power!”). Psychiatric medication is a life saver and an absolute necessity for many people.
I would also point out that a very large proportion of conservatives support Daniel Penny (and others like him) who killed a mentally ill man who was acting out in public. (Penny was “Guest of Honor” of Trump and Vance at the 2024 Army-Navy football game.) That’s horrific, but it’s even worse if conservatives also take away the psychiatric medications which would enable the mentally ill person to control their behavior in public. They are literally saying “you can’t have the medication that enables you to control your behavior, but if you don’t control your behavior, anyone in your vicinity is legally allowed to kill you”.
Rachel Bakes
Zoloft for 1 kid and transdermal methylphenidate for the other. Drove across CT today to get the latter since it’s back-ordered. We’re rationing his patches to get through the delay, along with driving to Mass, RI, NY for the last 3 months’ worth. Controlled substance so even if it was available no one is willing to let us stockpile.
Sister Golden Bear
@bluefoot:
This will be a repeat of 1) their court case to ban one of the abortion drugs for being “unsafe” despite being on the market for decade, and 2) of how TERFs in the UK used the Cass Report (discredited by multiple health research organizations worldwide) to cherry pick/made up data for a hit piece that was used to justify banning gender-affirming for trans kids. Similar efforts were used in Florida to effectively deny healthcare to all trans people.
Declare these drugs to be “unsafe,” ban their use, and threaten to prosecute any healthcare providers who prescribe them.
Alce _e_ardillo
While I am not a fan of psychiatric prescribing practices, which are a cross between balancing side effects and building a Jenga tower, Kennedy’s meat axe approach is not the way to go. He’s not a provider or a pharmacist, and he is a walking example of a little learning being a dangerous thing.
Matt
@Andrya:
🤢 Now he’s parlayed his vigilante murder into a job at a venture capital firm:
https://techcrunch.com/2025/02/06/a16z-stands-by-decision-to-hire-daniel-penny/
I assume Andressen asks him to tell the story over and over again while jorkin it…
Kayla Rudbek
@KayInMD (formerly Kay (not the front-pager)): and they also seem to work on other addictive behavior (excess spending, etc.). I know that my online shopping has greatly gone down after I started the weekly shots, to the point where I forget to buy things that I do really need.
Andrya
Notice that the EO said “assess the prevalence of and threat posed” by the classes of medications named. They aren’t even considering cost vs. benefit analysis, i.e. considering that some of these medications might do good.