Mental Illness As Brain Disease: A Brief History Lesson

Summary

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Szasz discusses a brief history lesson of mental illness as brain disease. Among others, he asserts that research in the last decade proves it is a lie, one more in a very long list in the history of psychiatry. The contention that mental illness is brain disease is as old as psychiatry itself; it is an integral part of the grand lie that psychiatry is a branch of medicine and healing, when in fact it is a branch of the law and social control.

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Mental Illness As Brain Disease: A Brief History Lesson

A 1999 White House Conference on Mental Health concluded: "Research in the last decade proves that mental illnesses are diagnosable disorders of the brain." President William Clinton was more specific: "Mental illness can be accurately diagnosed, successfully treated, just as physical illness." Persons who reject the view that mental illnesses are physical diseases are dism...

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