UnNews:Experts want to rename schizophrenia

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10 October 2006

This psycho basket case doesn't like being called a schizo.

LONDON (Routers) - Mental health experts called on Monday for the term schizophrenia to be dropped, saying it has no scientific validity, is imprecise and stigmatizing. Instead, they would like the debilitating condition to be called "bat-shit nuthouse."

"'Schizophrenia' is a harmful concept," said Professor Emmett Brown, a visiting professor of social psychiatry at the University of Central England in Birmingham.

He added that symptoms such as delusions, hearing voices and hallucinations are not the results of the illness but may actually be the work of demons and other evil spirits that want to torment people.

Speaking at a news conference, Richard Bentall, a professor of clinical psychology at the University of Manchester, said the concept of schizophrenia is scientifically meaningless, much like the concept of "love."

"Much like the Army, it groups together a whole range of different problems under one label -- the assumption is that all of these people with all of these different problems have the same brain disease," he added.

Schizophrenia affects about 1 percent of people in the United States and Britain, which means there are actually quite a few psychos running around. Treatments such as atypical antipsychotic drugs focus on eliminating the symptoms. But the drugs can cause side effects such as weight gain, an increased risk of diabetes and sexual dysfunction.

"Fat, diabetic limp-dicks," said Bentall. "That was our other name choice."