by Jon Davy
We have argued for a long time that nutrition plays a key role in mental health. When a leading psychiatric journal comes right out and admits the same thing, it’s like a tremor that tells a huge seismic shift - for the better - is coming....
The randomized, placebo controlled study reveals something that nutritionists have known for quite some time: that fish oil supplements can alleviate mental illness. It involved 81 people who were considered to be at high risk for psychosis. Fish oil supplements were administered to half the study subjects for 84 days while the other half received a placebo.
The results were very impressive: 11 people in the placebo group developed a psychotic disorder, while only 2 in the fish oil group did. Not only that, the research observed a protective effect from fish oils for an entire year even though the subjects only took them fish oils for 12 weeks! One can imagine how much more positive the results might have been had those subjects not stopped the fish oil after twelve weeks but carried on taking it!
Another interesting observation here is that the subjects not only benefitted from the fish oil but they were ABLE to stop taking it without any harmful effect. This is a marked contrast to psychiatric drugs where to suddenly stop taking the drug is to court disaster and the only safe way to stop is as medically supervised wean-down.
The study was relatively small, although some of us are surprised that psychiatry, which had seemed so irrevocably invested in its drug paradigm even entertained it at all. Perhaps the wind of change has reached even into psychiatry’s shuttered corridors. Be that as it may, the study does help to verify what many of us have been saying for years: fish oils, of which omega-3 fatty acids are thought to be the key nutritional factor, are important for "brain health," the smooth working of the nervous system and a boon to mental function.
Indeed, there is a lot known about the broad range of health benefits of omega-3 fatty acids. They help protect you against cardiovascular disease for one. For another, they can play a role in preventing diabetes and cancer.
In response to this latest study, Alison Cobb, of the mental health charity Mind, told the BBC: "If young people can be treated successfully with fish oils, this is hugely preferable to treating them with antipsychotics, which come with a range of problems from weight gain to sexual dysfunction, whereas omega-3s are actually beneficial to their general state of health."
We could not agree more. Psychiatric drugs given to kids with so-called ADHD or kids and adults with "depression" and so forth can bring about, in varying degrees of severity, a whole host of mental and physical problems, including violent outbursts, depression (I kid you not) diabetes, weight gain and blood sugar disorders and many others.
Not only that, psychiatric drugs are expensive both in terms of what they cost to buy and the costs of treating and repairing the physical and mental harm they do.
Fish oils on the other hand are FOOD, not toxins. As such they have none of these horrific side effects. Indeed, they have other very positive effects throughout the body - the joints for instance.
Psychiatrists, medical doctors and indeed anyone who wants to look after the mental and physical health of his fellow human beings would do well to dispense with the drugging and start recommending fish oils.
One word of advice, make sure you buy good qualify fish oil free from heavy metals, pesticides and other toxins, are sustainably harvested and that you can trust the manufacturer to provide consistent good quality.
Ask your nutritionist or your local reputable Health Food Store if you are uncertain.
As I have said before: a Golden Age is coming and there are no drugs in it.
It does however contain fish.
