Branding Diseases: Ray Moynihan on How Drug Companies Market Psychiatric Conditions

Mad in America: Rethinking Mental Health

Mad in America

Anxiety, Mental Health, Benzo, Science, Hearingvoices, Psychology, Antipsychotic, Mentalhealth, Depression, Panicattack, Psychosis, Medicine, Health, Health & Fitness, Psychiatry, Ssri, Antidepressant

4.8 • 201 Ratings

🗓️ 18 October 2023

⏱️ 47 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Ray Moynihan is an accomplished health journalist and author who has won several awards for his work. He is also an academic at Bond University and a documentary filmmaker. Moynihan's research and writing focus on the healthcare industry, with an emphasis on how diseases are created, branded, and marketed to unsuspecting people.

He is known for his use of sharp humor, which can be seen in his mock documentary about a fictional illness called 'Motivational Deficiency Disorder.' He is also a founding member of the international conference Preventing Overdiagnosis and hosts the podcast The Recommended Dose.

Today, we will be discussing something that the speaker refers to as "an assault on being human" - the labeling of everyday life struggles as disorders and how patient advocacy groups, doctors, medical journalists, and respected academics are often manipulated by a powerful, corporatized healthcare system.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to the Madden America podcast, your source for science, psychiatry and social justice.
0:11.4	Our podcasts are made possible in part by a grant from the Thomas Job Fund.
0:21.6	Hello, this is James and welcome to the podcast.
0:25.2	And this week, our science writer Ayur Di Dar interviews author and health journalist Dr. Ray Moinehan.
0:31.9	But before we get to the discussion, I wanted to let you know that in December, we'll be sharing a special episode of the podcast
0:38.4	where Madden America founder Robert Whitaker will be answering your questions.
0:43.7	Please send questions to AskMIA at maddenamerica.com.
0:47.9	That's ASKMIA at maddenamerica.com and we will pick a selection.
0:53.7	Please send us questions by November 10th and be
0:56.6	sure to let us know if you're happy to be identified or if you'd prefer to remain anonymous.
1:02.3	And now, on to the podcast. Hello everyone and welcome to Mad in America. This is your host for
1:08.2	today, Ayurdi Dhar. I am an assistant professor of psychology at the
1:12.1	University of West Georgia and a spotlight interviewer at Mad in America. Our guest today is Dr. Ray Moynihan,
1:19.2	someone whose work I covered when I used to be a science writer here at MIA, maybe like three or four years
1:25.1	ago or maybe more. Clearly it stayed with me.
1:28.3	So here he is and here I am.
1:31.3	He's an academic, a journalist,
1:33.3	and while he has numerous awards, journal articles and books to his name,
1:38.3	probably my favorite thing about Dr. Moynihan's work remains the mock pharmaceutical video he made
1:43.3	about a fake disease called
1:45.5	Motivational Deficiency Disorder. There was an accompanying piece in the British Medical
1:50.6	Journal about it, I think an April Fool prank. So this kind of will be the current focus
	...

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