Review
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NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
"The timing of Robert Whitaker's "Anatomy of an Epidemic," a comprehensive and highly readable history of psychiatry in
the United States, couldn't be better."
--Salon.com
"Anatomy of an Epidemic offers some answers, charting controversial ground with mystery-novel pacing." --TIME.com
"Lucid, pointed and important, Anatomy of an Epidemic should be required reading for anyone considering extended use of
psychiatric medicine. Whitaker is at the height of his powers." --Greg Critser, author of Generation Rx
"Why are so many more people disabled by mental illness than ever before? Why are those so diagnosed dying 10-25 years
earlier than others? In Anatomy of an Epidemic investigative reporter Robert Whitaker cuts through flawed science, greed
and outright lies to reveal that the drugs hailed as the cure for mental disorders instead worsen them over the long
term. But Whitaker's investigation also offers hope for the future: solid science backs nature's way of healing our
mental ills through time and human relationships. Whitaker tenderly interviews children and adults who bear witness to
the ravages of mental illness, and testify to their newly found "aliveness" when freed from the prison of mind-numbing
drugs." --Daniel Dorman, M.D., Clinical Assistant Professor of Psychiatry, UCLA School of Medicine and author of Dante's
Cure: A Journey Out of Madness
"This is the most alarming book I've read in years. The approach is neither polemical nor ideologically slanted. Relying
on medical evidence and historical documentation, Whitaker builds his case like a prosecuting attorney." --Carl Elliott,
M.D., Ph.D., Professor, Center for Bioethics, University of Minnesota and author of Better than Well: American Medicine
Meets the American Dream
"Anatomy of an Epidemic investigates a profoundly troubling question: do psychiatric medications increase the likelihood
that people taking them, far from being helped, are more likely to become chronically ill? In making a compelling case
that our current psychotropic drugs are causing as much--if not more--harm than good, Robert Whitaker reviews the
scientific literature thoroughly, demonstrating how much of the evidence is on his side. There is nothing unorthodox
here--this case is solid and evidence-backed. If psychiatry wants to retain its credibility with the public, it will now
have to engage with the scientific argument at the core of this cogently and elegantly written book." --David Healy,
M.D., Professor of Psychiatry, Cardiff University and author of The Antidepressant Era and Let Them Eat Prozac
"Anatomy of an Epidemic is a splendidly informed, wonderfully readable corrective to the conventional wisdom about the
biological bases--and biological cures--for mental illness. This is itself a wise and necessary book--essential reading
for all those who have experienced, or care for those who have experienced, mental illness--which means all of us!
Robert Whitaker is a reliable, sensible, and persuasive, guide to the paradoxes and complexities of what we know about
mental illness, and what we might be able to do to lessen the suffering it brings." --Jay Neugeboren, author of
Imagining Robert and Transforming Madness
"Every so often a book comes along that exposes a vast deceit. Robert Whitaker has written that sort of book. Drawing on
a prodigious quantity of psychiatric literature as well as heart-rending stories of individual patients, he exposes a
deeply disturbing fraud perpetrated by the drug industry and much of modern psychiatry--at horrendous human and
financial cost to patients, their families, and society as a whole. Scrupulously reported and written in compelling but
unemotional style, this book shreds the myth woven around today's psychiatric drugs." --Nils Bruzelius, former science
editor for the Boston Globe and the Washington Post
"A devastating critique. . . . One day, we will look back at the way we think about and treat mental illness and wonder
if we were all mad. Anatomy of an Epidemic should be required reading for both patients and physicians." --Shannon
Brownlee, senior research fellow, New America Foundation and author of Overtreated
About the Author
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ROBERT WHITAKER is the author of Mad in America, The maker's Wife, and On the Laps of Gods, all of which
won re as "notable books" of the year. His newspaper and magazine articles on the mentally ill and the
ceutical industry have garnered several national awards, including a George Polk Award for medical writing and a
National Association of Science Writers Award for best magazine article. A series he cowrote for the Boston Globe on the
abuse of mental patients in research settings was named a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 1998.