America's Medicated Army: Pentagon Turns to Antidepressants for Stressed-Out Troops

The current issue of Time has an insightful cover story about the growing number of U.S. troops taking antidepressants to deal with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and depression. Last fall, 20,000 soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan were prescribed antidepressants like Prozac and Zoloft. When one considers the experiences of veterans -- having friends killed, having to kill others, thinking that every day might be their last -- it is understandable that many would suffer from PTSD and take drugs to deal with their mental and physical trauma.

The Pentagon is actively pushing antidepressants as a solution for soldiers who suffer from PTSD. The wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have gone on much longer than anticipated. The military is at a breaking point yet there is a need to keep the soldiers out in "the field" for longer periods of time. It is ironic that the U.S. government spends $40 billion a year waging a drug war here at home that chases the "drug-free America" fantasy, while the Pentagon actively pushes legal drugs on the troops.

While the story focuses on the rise of prescription drug use among troops, there will surely be those who self-medicate with alcohol, marijuana and other drugs. I can't imagine what our troops are going through, and I support their use of antidepressants if it helps. But what helps is probably going to be a little different for every individual. I cannot get judgmental about people, be they soldiers, veterans or others -- even my own friends, family or coworkers -- who self-medicate with drugs, even if they are illicit. I have the same compassion for a veteran or coworker who uses marijuana to deal with stress or depression as I do for someone who seeks out a prescription for Prozac.

U.S. prisons are filled with nonviolent drug law violators, many serving mandatory sentences of 15-years-to-life for the possession of small amounts of drugs. Veterans who are incarcerated and separated from their families because of drug addictions resulting from their service in Iraq or Afghanistan will be yet more "collateral damage" of these wars.

It's easy to demand that everyone "support the troops." But if we're going to walk the talk, we had better be ready to offer compassion and treatment -- not a jail cell -- when it comes to helping our brothers and sisters heal from the horrors of war.

Tony Newman is the director of media relations for the Drug Policy Alliance (www.drugpolicy.org)

Comments

[egal]

These meds are a HUGE red flag.

First, if a person reaches the point of needing such medications, they need to be removed from stress environments or likely become suicide victims or, in battle zones, casualties. Making them take the meds and keep fighting elevates the risk of the medicated soldiers making mistakes or taking their own lives within a decade of service almost to saturation.

Second, that's not even counting the deleterious side effects of the meds, which include nausea, dizziness, hallucinations, passing out, fatigue, and slowed reflexes among many others, and necessarily require these afflicted soldiers to be removed from a warzone. Making them stay endangers the soldiers around them and makes their mental health recovery an almost certain failure.

Third, even if they should be able to stop the medications after returning home (those who do tend to suicide), they will face permanent psychological, emotional, physical, and even chemical changes because of the drugs, the experiences, or some combination thereof. These soldiers suffer nightmares and more, but they also may lose their families, be ridiculed by fellow soldiers who use bullying to feel better, or misunderstood by the civilians around them. Holding a job is usually an impossibility, and triggers can undo years of recuperation.

Add the innumerable manners in which their own president has betrayed them, and you have a recipe for disaster in their lives and those of the people around soldiers who are being medicated to suppress symptoms instead of being treated to recover.

[MRb1000]

I bet that is not the only drug that is given out. Hey like pain killers by the ton.

[faith]

Would that the entire nation would read about this and get a feeling for what our troops are experiencing. Absolutely tragic how apathetic this nation has become. As someone recently said, oh it's not my kid who should go to war....

[RadicalChick]

Listen. People can view medication for vets (and anyone else) with alarm, but my husband, 59 years old, has suffered terribly with PTSD --- from Vietnam!!! He is at this moment doing an inpatient prorgram at a suburban VA hospital for survivors of PTSD. Actually, they've found an apparently better strategy for PTSD --- something called EMDR, which I don't claim to understand, but that apparently has something to do with the types of eve movements one gets in REM sleep, which of course is the one a person needs most.

[LexLuthier]

When I returned from Viet Nam, I was surprised to find the level of guilt and anger that followed me. If I had not been able to self-medicate with marijuana, I honestly don't know what I would have done.
As the years went by, I realized that there were side effects that contraindicated the benefit and I stopped. Today, I don't even use aspirin, but I've always resented the fact that other people make decisions that put me in jeopardy for making choices about taking responsibility for my own mental health. Getting stoned and communing with Nature what got me through. If you've never been, you just don't know. Vets who are returning now, you know you would never choose to do what you were forced to do. You were used, and you have to find whatever it takes to absolve yourselves.