Watchdog Warns Psychiatry May Thwart Federal Antidepressant Deprescribing Plan

The Citizens Commission on Human Rights International (CCHR), a mental health industry watchdog, is cautioning that organized psychiatry's long-standing pattern of minimizing risks associated with psychiatric drugs could weaken or thwart the Department of Health and Human Services' May 2026 plan to address overprescribing and support safe deprescribing and tapering of antidepressants. CCHR is urging federal officials to implement stronger protections for informed consent and patient safety.

The federal shift toward deprescribing represents a long-overdue health action, aligning with international concerns such as the 2024 UK All-Party Parliamentary Group report, which called for deprescribing antidepressants and creating withdrawal support services. However, some within U.S. psychiatry, while appearing to welcome efforts to improve mental health treatment, have minimized legitimate concerns about antidepressants and instead cited workforce shortages and limited beds. CCHR views this as a thinly veiled request for more funding, despite mental health spending skyrocketing 241% from $40.9 billion in 2000 to $139.6 billion in 2021, while outcomes have worsened, as highlighted in an April 2026 U.S. House Subcommittee roundtable.

Following HHS's consumer-protection plans, a psychiatric committee formed in 2025 to counter these initiatives and recently conducted a highly selective survey at a major psychiatric annual meeting. Of 229 psychiatrists who responded, 94% disagreed that the HHS reforms would help their field. CCHR sees this as an exercise designed to manufacture opposition to deprescribing in order to protect antidepressant prescribing.

In 2002, a psychiatric leader who now serves as secretary of that committee was president and CEO of a major psychiatric hospital in Maryland, where clinical drug trials were conducted under contracts from multiple pharmaceutical companies, including for "treatment-resistant depression." It was publicly stated that there was tremendous excitement in new psychiatric pharmaceuticals, noting the hospital's large patient volume made it a valuable asset to pharmaceutical clients. A high-profile mass shooter was once treated at this hospital, where he was prescribed antidepressants linked to violent and suicidal behavior.

In 2004, the psychiatrist formally opposed an FDA Black Box warning on SSRI antidepressants and suicide risk in children. Together with the president of a U.S. psychiatric association, he issued a joint statement expressing deep concern that a black-box warning might have a chilling effect on prescribing. This occurred when at least 100 families in the U.S. had loved ones who committed suicide while taking antidepressants.

Jan Eastgate, President of CCHR International, said, "For years, the mental health field touted the mantra that depression was caused by a chemical imbalance — a claim CCHR refuted since the first SSRI antidepressant came on the market in 1988." A major 2022 University College London umbrella review in Molecular Psychiatry delivered irrefutable evidence disproving the serotonin theory of depression.

Eastgate warns: "Given this decades-long pattern of downplaying risks, opposing warnings and maintaining pharmaceutical relationships, claims that organized psychiatry will genuinely support the current Administration's deprescribing efforts lack credibility. Their track record suggests a continued priority on preserving unchecked prescribing patterns over patient safety."

CCHR urges federal officials to fully implement the HHS plan with strong safeguards for informed consent and deprescribing support.