Posted: November 7, 2006
Title: Campaign Calls for End to Schizophrenia Label
Date: 11-07-2006
Time: 1:00:00 am EST
Some British experts have launched the Campaign for the Abolition of the Schizophrenic Label, calling for an end to the diagnosis of schizophrenia on the grounds that it is unscientific, stigmatizing, and extremely damaging to people who receive such a diagnosis. “It is like canceling someone’s life,” said Paul Hammersley of the University of Manchester, who helped organize the campaign. Hammersley added that there is no agreement on the cause or treatment of the illness. Another of the organizers, Professor Richard Bentall, also of the University of Manchester, noted that the diagnosis covers a broad range of problems and also assumes a sharp division between sanity and insanity that does not exist. “The concept is scientifically meaningless,” Bentall said.
In a related story, about a million and a half Americans were diagnosed with schizophrenia as of 2002 estimates (the most recent year available), according to a study published in the November issue of Psychological Medicine. The study used administrative claims databases to come up with the figure. Estimates place the total U.S. population in 2002 at 288.4 million
Sources: CNN, 24dash.com, Business Wire, U.S. Census Bureau
