Whistleblower Reveals Financial Wrongdoing
According to a former AFSP volunteer-turnedwhistleblower who spoke to a reporter, grief and guilt-stricken suicide survivors are boldly targeted by the organization. They are asked to raise money, approach funders, and lead fundraising“ walks” in flagrant exploitation and monetization of their emotional vulnerabilities and scars.
AFSP’ s request that at the Northwestern event, participants wear colored bracelets to signal that 1) they have considered suicide or 2) they have survived the suicide of loved ones sounds downright ghoulish in light of the whistleblower’ s disclosures.
Despite what the foundation says, AFSP administrators receive the lion’ s share of money from“ donations,” said the whistleblower after viewing financial records. The group’ s claim that it created the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline is also a lie— the phone line was created by the government, says the whistleblower.
An internet search revealed that Dr. Christine Yu Moutier, AFSP’ s Chief Medical Officer, is a paid consultant for Otsuka Pharmaceutical Development & Commercialization, Inc. Other AFSP principals are also Pharma-funded.
AFSP receives and / or has received funding from the prominent drugmakers Janssen, Pfizer, Sunovion, Boehringer Ingelheim, and Mylan, according to internet searches. It even takes funding from the gun industry.
Why Does Funding Matter?
If you are a newcomer to the SSRI / suicide“ wars,” for more than 20 years, SSRI antidepressants( commonly given to prevent suicides) have been linked to suicidal ideation and behavior in children and adolescents and sported the FDA’ s strongest warning for patients and doctors. The drugs, prescribed to prevent suicide, can also allegedly cause it.
To reporters and family members who have directly dealt with these uncomfortable facts, a drugmaker-funded group claiming it will stop suicides is like the liquor industry claiming it will stop car accidents.
AFSP has lobbied against the sales-deflating suicide warnings on the medication labels and worse: the group promotes the“ chemical imbalance” theory that means patients need to stay on drugs for life because they’ ve got a permanent brain problem.
A recent appearance of Angela Cummings and Steve Moore of the Illinois AFSP Chapter on Chicago’ s WBBM radio station to promote the Northwestern fundraiser betrayed the group’ s stealth drug marketing.
On the radio spot, Cummings, Executive Director of the Illinois AFSP, conveyed that people with“ a lifelong” mental health condition who are on lifelong meds are no different from those with“ diabetes” and“ high blood pressure.”
The Executive Director certainly earned her Pharma funding by stumping for lifelong meds, but the“ chemical imbalance” theory of depression she referred to was definitively disproven in the journal Nature in 2023 through systematic reviews, metaanalyses, and large datasets. Did she miss it?
In obsequious,“ consensus-building” language, Cummings also lauds the success her group and others have had in selling mental illness to young people:
“ They don’ t see any stigma in it. They’ re not ashamed to ask for their mental health days that they’ re allotted at school. For example, you know, they put stickers on their laptops and water bottles that say,“ Mental health matters.” And“ It’ s okay not to be okay” shirts say the same thing. So, I really think they’ ve just grown up in a culture where it’ s just a lot more acceptable to talk about mental health.”
Conclusion
The only thing more shocking and rapid than Pharma promoting awareness of“ illnesses” to sell drugs is how categorically and quickly the general public has picked up the cudgel. Hopefully, participants in Northwestern’ s event realized they were aiding an opportunistic foundation, not fellow students.
38 x The Trial Lawyer