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Ban Electroshock Therapy ECT: Brutality Prescribed Max Fink, Crazed Pro-ECT Shrink August 16, 2025 – Robert Carter      Even Dr. Charles Nemeroff, Chair of Psychiatry at the University of Texas at Austin, called pro-ECT psychiatrist Max Fink “an irascible, dominant figure” and “a zealot, no question about it. He thought ECT was a panacea.”      In 1985 Fink had founded the journal Convulsive Therapy, now a website, and served on the American Psychiatric Association’s task forces on ECT in the nineteen-seventies and nineteen-eighties. He was the most active voice within psychiatry for the use of electroshock therapy until his death this year, but he had not always been a fan of ECT.      After watching an ECT treatment in 1952, he said “As the currents were applied, the neck and back arched, the body became rigid, followed by rhythmic muscle movements and breath holding. The patient became cyanotic with blue lips, movements stopped, the muscles relaxed, deep breathing followed, cyanosis waned, and color returned to the lips as the patient was moved to a recovery room.”      He claimed he was “jarred” by the sight because he had been trained that all convulsions were to be avoided as they could cause fractures and lethal injuries.      Somehow, over the following yeas, his view of ECT changed considerably.      He soon decided that ECT had a biochemical healing basis and he  eventually concluded that the memory loss that was induced by ECT was actually “a hysterical symptom,” parallel to the public’s highly emotional reaction to the Camelford, England, sulphuric acid water pollution  catastrophe in 1988. That catastrophe proved to have severe short term and long term effects on many of the local residents of Cornwall. That hysteria was not unwarranted.      As he gained prominence in the psychiatric world, Fink was awarded U.S. government funding for a large study that compared the ECT to psychiatric medication for severely depressed patients. Unbelievably, Fink claimed that his study found that of 87 percent of his patients went into remission from depression after ECT.      No study before or since ever claimed anything even close to that efficacy rate, and most studies done in the last twenty years show very little remission immediately, and almost no long term remission of symptoms after ECT treatments. Fink’s “results” also do not measure the long term dangers to ECT patients from short and long term memory loss, increased cardiac difficulties, and increased suicide rates.      A 2002 Times of India article on Fink reported that when asked “How safe is ECT?” Fink’s cavalier reply was “If there are some deaths, that has only to do with the fact that they didn’t do it right.”      Over his long life Fink advanced the idea within psychiatry that  electroconvulsive therapy was a valuable treatment and it shouldn’t be considered just as a last resort, which the FDA has dictated is its only  application. In 2019, as he received a lifetime achievement award from the Institute of Living , a prominent ECT delivery center in Hartford, Conn, he did acknowledge, though, that “We had a problem getting this accepted by the public.”      Given the number of lives that have been affected by the brutal effects of ECT, that’s hardly surprising, Max.      Unfortunately, though, the  psychiatric profession has not had that much problem being convinced of Fink’s false claims for ECT.  Psychiatrists deliver more than a million ECT sessions globally each year. Comments are moderated. You must be logged in to comment. Please keep it civil 

Ban Electroshock Therapy ECT: Brutality Prescribed Electroconvulsive “Therapy” Today: No Regulations, No Scientific Criteria … Just Immense Profits June 24, 2025 – Robert Carter      Electroconvulsive therapy continues to be a  dangerously unregulated industry and too much about its practice remains shrouded in secrecy.      The FDA has not tested the safety or the effectiveness of ECT. They only say that they do not rule on “the practice of medicine.” That’s what they call the 460 volts of electricity that passes through an ECT patient’s brain in order to induce a grand mal seizure.      Of course, every other doctor on the planet is trying to prevent people from having grand mal seizures because of the sudden loss of consciousness and violent muscle contractions that occur from them.      Thymatron, one of three manufacturers of ECT devices, does write in their product’s safety warning that there is a “risk of death” with their machine. The warning also notes that “Some patients who were suicidal before receiving ECT eventually committed suicide after receiving ECT” from their machine.      The fact is that for the last forty years there have been no rigorous, placebo based clinical trials testing the safety or the effectiveness of ECT. Those few that had been conducted before 1986 are scientifically questionable.      There is, however, bona fide evidence since for the severe memory loss and the increased cardiac risks that come from ECT.      It is estimated that over one hundred thousand Americans – mostly women and elderly – undergo ECT annually, but no one knows for sure. Since the reclassification of ECT devices by the FDA from Class III to II in 1978, some estimates suggest that there has been a 34 percent increase in ECT use, but without any binding regulations, no one is obliged to report any statistics on ECT use.      Because those institutions and practitioners that deliver ECT do so under the radar of any watchdog agencies or whistleblowers, they can easily violate their patients’ rights by forcing ECT’s brutal voltage on someone…and reap the $300 to $1000 reimbursement for each three minute long ECT session.      The FDA did rule in 1978 that it is okay to use a Class II Thyamatron ECT device, but only on those who suffer from catatonia or from unresponsive and severe mental disorder.      There is no proven chemical imbalance or other objective physical evidence behind psychiatry’s three hundred plus mental “disorders” listed in their Diagnostic and Statistical Manual …such as catatonia or severe mental disorder.      However, when a patient is so labeled, usually by a psychiatrist, they are then seen as too incompetent to understand the informed consent procedure, and so they lose their legal right to it. The psychiatrist or family member then approves the 6-12 electroshock treatments that normally constitute the first series of electroshocks for a patient.      That means that one hundred thousand ECT victims in America every year can have 460 volts run through their brain to induce a seizure with no regulatory oversight and no legal protection, based on what is little more than the whim of a psychiatrist.      A very wealthy psychiatrist. Comments are moderated. You must be logged in to comment. Please keep it civil 

Ban Electroshock Therapy ECT: Brutality Prescribed FDA’s Approval of ECT Device Parallels 1950s Psychiatric Mind Control Experiments June 5, 2025 – Robert Carter “For several years past we have been treating severe resistant depression with long periods of sleep treatment. We can now keep patients asleep or very drowsy for up to 3 months if necessary. During sleep treatment we also give them ECT,” wrote British psychiatrist William Sargant in the early 1950s. “We may be seeing here a new exciting beginning in psychiatry…” Sargant adds, “Many patients unable to tolerate a long course of ECT can do so when anxiety is relieved by narcosis. What is so valuable is that they generally have no memory about the actual length of the treatment or the numbers of ECT used.” In 1957 Sargant’s book Battle for the Mind was published and it became known as one of the first “manuals” on brainwashing. Sargant’s work had already become known by psychiatrist Donald Cameron, who had been trying to “correct” schizophrenia by erasing existing memories and reprogramming the mind. He used ECT at thirty to forty times the usual voltage to do so, and he ran the CIA funded MKUltra mind control experiments at Montreal’s Allan Memorial Institute from 1957 to 1964. Both Cameron and Sargant were proponents of those early “chemical balance” theories that considered mental illness a genetic disorder. Both psychiatrists claimed society needed to be cleansed of the mentally ill so they didn’t contaminate others by passing on their mental disorders to their children. In his lecture entitled Dangerous Men and Women Cameron had said, “Get it understood how dangerous these damaged, sick personalities are to ourselves and above all, to our children, whose traits are taking form, and we shall find ways to put an end to them.” He was speaking about the Germans after WWII, but he also said that mental disorders were contagions and that anyone in any society could be infected by mental disorders. Hence, ECT was used to eliminate them. Sargant, too, considered that mental illness was biologically based, and he advocated anyone with a mental disorder be treated early and quickly with ECT and heavy medication…and with deep sleep therapy for those who resisted those brutal treatments. Today the FDA refuses to rule on the use of ECT because they say they don’t rule on “the practice of medicine.” They somehow consider ECT’s jolt of 460 volts of electricity through a patient’s brain to induce a grand mal seizure to be “medicine.” The FDA did, however, downgrade ECT devices in 2018 to a Class II classification – moderate risk requiring general and specific control precautions – but only when a patient is diagnosed with catatonic schizophrenia or unresponsive severe mental disorders. These are the two conditions Sargant and Cameron claimed they were trying to eradicate with their use of ECT and other treatments…the same treatments Sargant based his mind control book on. Today a patient is only given ECT after they have been fully anaesthetized. They are put to sleep so they don’t feel the extreme discomfort of the body paralysis drug they are given to reduce the risk of broken teeth or cracked vertebrae because of the violence of their grand mal seizures. We don’t know what overt pressure from psychiatrists the FDA might have received to prompt their downgrading of the ECT device from a Class III (high risk) to a Class II (moderate risk) category so that ECT could be used on these “mental disorders.” The ideological collusion between their decision and these earlier mind control experiments by psychiatrists is noteworthy, however, and it suggests an uncomfortable strain of punishment and control is still prevalent in today’s psychiatric model. Comments are moderated. You must be logged in to comment. Please keep it civil

Ban Electroshock Therapy ECT: Brutality Prescribed The FDA Won’t Rule on ECT, But the Maker of the ECT Device Warns of Suicide and Death      Somatics, LLC, is one of two manufacturers of ECT devices in the US, and they issue a manual with each of their Thymatron IV ECT instruments. After a short, three paragraph introduction to its intended use and intended population, the manual immediately goes into “Safety Information.”      Their first warning?      “Various medical conditions are associated with substantially increased risk from ECT, including risk of death.”            Their second?      “ECT device use may be associated with disorientation, confusion, and memory problems.”      Their third warning includes: “The long-term safety and effectiveness of ECT treatment has not been demonstrated, and long-term follow-up may be needed.”        And their fourth?        “Some patients who were suicidal before receiving ECT eventually committed suicide after receiving ECT, including after receiving ECT with a Thymatron® device.”      Quite a machine eh?      The FDA has not ruled for or against the delivery of ECT, but they have allowed these devices to be used on those diagnosed with catatonia or severe major depressive disorder. The FDA claims administering ECT is “the practice of medicine,” and they’d don’t rule on that.      The warnings in the Thymatron manual, however, give any prospective patient good reason to refuse ECT…if they were lucky enough to have been given the full Informed Consent briefing that is legally required. Anecdotal evidence suggests that doesn’t happen very often.      Why?        For one thing, a new Thymatron IV costs about four hundred bucks. You can get the deluxe model for $900, but the standard $419 version delivers more than enough of an electrical jolt — up to 460 volts – to induce at least a twenty second seizure in an anesthetized and paralyzed patient.      What can a psychiatrist charge for that five to ten minute procedure? $300 to $1000. A patient typically undergoes 6-12 of those procedures during their initial program of treatment. That’s somewhere between about $2000 and $12,000 per patient from a four hundred dollar device. Most ECT patients have at least one more series of treatments, as well, because any effects from the first set are very short lived.      How many shocks can a Thymatron IV administer before it wears out?      We don’t know, but the manufacturer writes “Most ECT units sent to us for presumed malfunction have nothing wrong with them!” (The exclamation point is theirs – a nice little marketing flourish). So a psychiatrist can shell out four hundred bucks, turn on a switch to quickly zap a patient, and watch his profits roll in time after time after time.Nice return on investment in terms of profit.      Maybe not so nice, though, in terms of karma. Comments are moderated. You must be logged in to comment. Please keep it civil 

Ban Electroshock Therapy ECT: Brutality Prescribed You Can’t Make Any Sense of an Argument for More ECT April 25, 2025 – Robert Carter      When the basic premises of a subject are whacky, it doesn’t take long to find oneself swimming in a surreal sea of topsy-turvy values, priorities, and morality.      The Penn State College of Medicine has just released a study that shows that hospital patients who have undergone electroconvulsive therapy were hospitalized twice as long and had twice as high health care costs as patients who received non-ECT care for their depression or bipolar disorder.      “Although ECT is an effective therapy for treatment-resistant depression, its high cost is a deterrent,” said the study author Edeanya Agbese. “If this therapy were delivered in an outpatient setting, it’s possible that the potential of reduced cost burdens to patients and insurers could increase utilization of ECT in the U.S.”      Wonderful.      We are off into the hazy la-la land of “logic” created by the pro-ECT crowd. Frankly, ECT sessions are charged at $300 to $1000 per session these days, and the normal course of initial treatment consists of 6-12 sessions. How is anybody losing any money here anyway?      More importantly, there have been no extensive studies of the overall effects from ECT for the last forty years, so no one knows for sure how harmful – okay, or how beneficial – this treatment is.      We do know that running up to 460 volts through a person’s brain is horrific enough that their body has to be paralyzed and anesthetized beforehand. We know also that every other doctor on the planet is trying to prevent seizures, not cause them.      Add to that the large amount of anecdotal evidence of permanent memory loss and the known, post-ECT incidence of cardiac failure, and what are the chances, really, that this barbaric “therapy” has any positive value?      Yet, Ms. Agbese is angling for even more ECT to be delivered to out-patients so that hospitals don’t lose money because private insurers refuse to pay for the increased costs of impatient ECT delivery.      First, doesn’t the fact that patients take twice as long to recover from ECT as they do from other treatments for depression raise red flags about the amount of physical damage done by ECT?      Second, the big downside here, per Ms. Agbese, is the lack of reimbursement to the hospital, not the apparent trauma of the ECT recipient.      Third, a lot more of this horrific procedure can be delivered if we would only increase the number of outpatient vendors of it? If someone is a mess for twice as long afterward, that’s no problem. At least it won’t be costing the hospital valuable revenue.      When we are being told black is white and up is down – as we consistently are by these people – we have entered a psychiatric Twilight Zone that may be entertaining fiction, but reflects only horror when it is real life. Comments are moderated. You must be logged in to comment. Please keep it civil 

Ban Electroshock Therapy ECT: Brutality Prescribed How to Evaluate ECT? Let’s Try Common Sense March 22, 2025 – Robert Carter      There are many studies that have been done over the years about ECT. Some have been used to argue in favor of its use while others have been used to show it is only a destructive  procedure. Much of this research, on either side, is too questionable to be trusted. Worse, it bogs people down in relatively unimportant minutiae about ECT. It distracts.      A common sense  viewpoint about ECT can easily be obtained, however, just by looking at three key, uncontested facts.      First, ECT emits electric shocks up to 460 volts to a human brain, but only after injecting a person with the paralyzing drug used at electrocutions (so that vertebrae are not broken and teeth are not crushed from the electroshock). Before the paralytic drug is administered, an anesthetic is given to the person so he or, more likely, she cannot feel the pain of body paralysis. And before that, a gel or paste is applied underneath the electrodes so that the patient’s skin is not burned by the intense electricity passing through it.      Second, the reason this brutal shock is being administered to a person in the first place is to induce a grand mal seizure that will last at least twenty seconds. This protocol is based on the questionable psychiatric theory that a strong enough seizure can help cure various mental disorders.      Every other doctor on the planet, of course, is doing all they can to prevent seizures.       Third, the FDA has never approved any electroshock device. It has only “cleared” them. That means it has only spent around 20 hours investigating the devices, not the 1200 hours usually spent reviewing all the scientific data regarding their safety and  effectiveness which only then can lead to a product’s “approval” by the FDA.      Of course, at $300 to $1000 per ECT session, and a standard initial ECT program consisting of between 5 and 15 treatments, with often another 10 to 20 maintenance treatments per year, it may never happen that the FDA — mostly funded by the Big Pharma/psychiatry folks – will ever take it upon themselves to look into the actual safety or effectiveness of ECT.      That’s their brand of common sense.      Follow the money. Comments are moderated. You must be logged in to comment. Please keep it civil