SPECIAL SUNDAY POST

My apologies for not posting on Friday. The surgery went well and I can sit with little pain.

Today, I’ll like to look at the Florida school shooting. One of the deadliest school shootings in American history took place this week in Parkland, Florida

Believe me it has an economic angle to the story.

Whenever there is a mass shooting, the TV news outlets — whether it be the network news or the cable outlets — we get the make and model of the weapon, how many rounds were fired and perhaps how the shooter acquired the weapon.

Lately the news organization seem to think we are bored with that information so they come up with another aspect of the weapon.

Bumper stock comes to mind in the Las Vegas shooting. We had demonstrations of what it looked like and what it does.

But here’s is what All TV news networks don’t want you to hear. Nikolas Cruz — along with many other mass shootings suspects especially in schools — “have a history of developmental and learning disabilities,” including Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, and was “increasingly irate,” according to his adopted mother Lynda Cruz in a police report.

So here is the economic angle of the post.

Why do the networks not tell you about that? Well stay tuned to the channel for the next commercial and it will be from a drug company for some prescription effecting older Americans. The general audience for daytime news shows on cable TV are retired Americans who are unaware they are suffering from these ailments until a new drug is offered to fix it.

“Ask your doctor if this pill will work for you.”

So the news director tells the anchors, we will not be addressing his prescription drug use. Because if it was not for the drug company revenue, then many of these stations would be showing re-runs, because they could not afford to have news divisions.

And so now we go back to Nikolas Cruz. His lawyers are looking into his medical history, but say they already suspect he suffered from depression.

If Cruz was prescribed a drug such as Prozac, Paxil, Zoloft, Luvox, or Effexor — which all fall under the label of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, or SSRIs — and can be prescibed for depression, this could have influenced his behavior.

These drugs carry the government’s most serious warning of “increased risks of suicidal thinking and behavior, known as suicidality, in young adults ages 18 to 24.” That language is called a “black box warning,” which means it stands on the sheet of instructions that are inside the prescription box.

“27 International drug regulatory warnings [not the FDA] cite violence, mania, hostility, aggression, psychosis and even homicidal ideation” by using these drugs, according to a CCHR a mental health watchdog group.

Here is an list of some of the worst teenage killings in the US and the perpetrator taking SSRIs or as they also call them psychotropic drugs.

Luvox alone carries this dire warning: of mania, a dangerous and violence-prone mental derangement characterized by extreme excitement and delusion. If it was Paxil, its warning label also includes mania, along with “insomnia, anxiety, agitation, confusion, amnesia, depression, paranoid reaction, psychosis, hostility, delirium, hallucinations, abnormal thinking, depersonalization and lack of emotion,” among others.

And this from the Mayo Clinic:

Suicide risk and antidepressants Most antidepressants are generally safe, but the FDA requires that all antidepressants carry black box warnings, the strictest warnings for prescriptions. In some cases, children, teenagers and young adults under 25 may have an increase in suicidal thoughts or behavior when taking antidepressants, especially in the first few weeks after starting or when the dose is changed.

Anyone taking an antidepressant should be watched closely for worsening depression or unusual behavior. If you or someone you know has suicidal thoughts when taking an antidepressant, immediately contact your doctor or get emergency help is the more generic warning for other SSRIs.

So while some antidepressants are more likely to reduce suicide risk in the long run by improving mood, in the beginning or when you suddenly quit them, they have a higher risk of violence.

We may never know if Cruz stop taking medication when he moved out of his foster home prior to the shooting.

But I can guarantee, that topic will not addressed on your TV news.

And now a word from Lyrica.