Why is this a handout to drug companies? Because these so-called mental health "disorders" are often fictitious diseases (like ADHD) that can easily be attributed to nearly anyone. And once a person is labeled "diseased," they can be put on expensive prescription drugs to alter their brain chemistry. Make no mistake: this sweeping "public health" initiative is really just a clever way to dope up half the population with expensive prescription drugs that alter brain chemistry. It's a devious plan. And it's an invasion of personal privacy.
It's all made even worse by the sad fact that antidepressant drugs, which will no doubt be prescribed in large quantities under this initiative, are now proven to cause a 400% increase in the risk of a patient committing suicide. They also provoke patients to engage in violent acts against others. These antidepressants alter brain chemistry in dangerous ways and should probably be banned, not unleashed on the entire population.
The fact is, people don't need prescription drugs to deal with mental health problems in the first place. What they need is good nutrition that includes cod liver oil or other sources of vitamin D (a vitamin D deficiency is one of the most common causes of mental instability), a daily dose of natural sunlight on their skin (sunshine cures depression, and lack of sunshine is strongly correlated with clinical depression in the medical literature), regular physical exercise (strength training, jogging, swimming or other forms of physical exercise powerfully alter brain chemistry in an uplifting way), and of course the consumption of superior nutritional supplements made with brain-boosting medicinal herbs, organic whole foods, or superfoods.
That's how you solve depression, dementia, schizophrenia and other mental disorders. And you can eliminate ADHD practically overnight by taking children off foods loaded with added sugars or refined carbohydrates and putting them on whole foods, organic foods and select nutritional supplements. See, mental health problems are not caused by a lack of prescription drugs: they're caused by a lack of nutrition, sunlight and healthy physical activity. If you want the entire country to experience outstanding mental health, you've got to get the people to make healthy lifestyle choices and keep them far away from prescription drugs.
But of course actually enhancing the mental health of patients was never the goal of Bush's program. The intent, it seems, is to generate billions of dollars in profits for Big Pharma while keeping the population in a zombie-like state of mind where they will support more military action against Iraq, or, at least, not question authority when Ashcroft passes the second version of the Patriot Act that makes it a federal crime to not take your medications...