{"id":159539,"date":"2023-03-11T10:22:21","date_gmt":"2023-03-11T14:22:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/?p=159539"},"modified":"2023-03-11T10:22:21","modified_gmt":"2023-03-11T14:22:21","slug":"nami-front-group-for-the-psychopharmaceutical-industry-and-pharmas-latest-way-to-promote-their-toxic-products","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/?p=159539","title":{"rendered":"NAMI: Front Group for the psychopharmaceutical industry (and Pharma’s latest way to promote their toxic products)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Duty to Warn<\/strong><\/h3>\n

The National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI): Just One of the Many Cunning Front Groups for Marketing Psych Drugs for Big Pharma<\/strong><\/h2>\n

By Gary G. Kohls, MD<\/p>\n

Excerpts from: https:\/\/www.cchrint.org\/issues\/psycho-pharmaceutical-front-groups\/nami\/<\/a><\/p>\n

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\u201cHe who pays the piper, calls the tune.\u201d<\/em><\/h4>\n
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In the late 1970s and 1980s, prominent American Psychiatric Association (APA)<\/strong> psychiatrists, who were also directors and researchers with the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), <\/strong>were in need of more government funding, so they devised a plan to create patient advocacy organizations (PAOs)<\/strong> with the intention of getting these groups to help lobby Congress for increased funding for psychiatric research. The groups that emerged first on the scene were: The National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI), the Anxiety Disorders Association of America (ADAA), the\u00a0National Depression & Manic Depressive Association (NDMDA, and the National Alliance for Research on Schizophrenia and Depression (NARSAD). \u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cIn an incestuous relationship, many of these groups were formed by the directors or researchers from NIMH\u2014the very organization that needed mental health advocacy groups to make demands on Congress for increased funding. All of them had board or advisory board members with financial ties to Pharma and the majority of them were heavily funded by Pharma.<\/p>\n

This cunning marketing\/lobbying strategy is still going on to this day and few physicians \u2013 and fewer politicians and patients – have seen through the subterfuge.<\/p>\n

This is the strategy in a nutshell: \u201cSet up and fully fund PAOs to lobby for the governmental funding needed for Big Psychiatry and Big Pharma while pretending to be \u201cadvocates\u201d for the mentally ill.<\/p>\n

NAMI was founded in 1979 with tens of millions of dollars of start-up funding coming from Big Pharma companies that marketed psychotropic drugs. The group continues to rely upon pharmaceutical funding and has used up more than $41 million since 1996. A U.S. Senate investigation revealed that in just two years alone (2006-2008) Big Pharma funded NAMI to the tune of $23 million <\/em><\/strong>– about three-quarters of its donations.<\/p>\n

Groups like NAMI were established by representatives of the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) and the American Psychiatric Association, all of whom had conflicts of interest that were not disclosed<\/em><\/strong>. They have successfully secured billions of tax dollars for NIMH and psychiatric researchers.<\/p>\n

Here are some facts that reveal some aspects of what could be described as the unholy alliance between Big Pharma and Big Psychiatry:<\/p>\n