LETTERS PROTESTING THE PSYCHIATRIC TORTURE OF REBECCA MERHAV :

2. AMY PHILO

Under the title/subject LET REBECCA GO her letter is addressed to the treating psychatrist with copies to the Minister for Mental Health, the Chief Psychiatrist,and the Health Services Commissioner, Victoria, Australia.



To all those who currently have the power to influence the CTO placed on Rebecca Merhav:

I am a U.S. Citizen and survivor of Zoloft and psychiatry. In 2004 I was forcibly held in a psychiatric hospital for two days and separated from my newborn baby and my family for much of that time. I considered that to be the worst time of my life and I had no idea that I should have considered myself fortunate that the treatment was no worse. I took Zoloft for only 3 days before it made me suicidal and homicidal. I stayed on it for 5 months because of advice that I needed to give it time to work or raise my dose even higher to get a therapeutic effect, before going off of it against medical advice and discovering that I was indeed not mentally ill while not taking prescription mind-altering drugs.

For 30 years Rebecca has been subjected to these dangerous experiments and it is nothing short of a miracle that she has survived the torture of psychiatry. She definitely has a strong spirit and protection from God to be able to survive all this and it is probably divine intervention that keeps her going so she can fulfill her purpose. I pray that her life will not be cut short by your cruel treatments and that she will not become an example of the deaths often caused by Neuroleptic Malignant Syndrome.

I have struggled to understand for a long time why you have been allowed to force Rebecca Merhav to ingest and absorb these drugs that are so dangerous and toxic. Your forced treatment of her is endangering her life. It is her desire and that of her father that she be given an opportunity to taper off of the medications and restore her health through natural means. To refuse a patient the right to control the course of their own life is to take away their freedom, and taking away freedom when someone has committed no crime is unjustifiable torture.

Recent studies show that antipsychotic medications do not improve outcomes for patients and actually did worse than placebo. Therefore, the only logical justification you could possibly have to be forcing this woman to take these drugs is that you are either ignorant of evidence against the drugs, completely incompetent, or you are intentionally trying to hurt or kill her. This is a failed trial and the drugs are not helping Rebecca, all they are doing is hastening her death.

I have been tempted in the past to contact U.S. officials or international organizations to intervene. I have been urged not to do so by Rebecca's father Ben because all he wants for Rebecca is a chance at a normal life and not to be turned into a media target in the process.I am a mother of two and if this were to ever happen to my children I would be tempted to take much more severe and punitive actions against the people attempting to kill my children. Clearly Ben has been more than rational and patient with you and is following all of the normal protocol and appeal process put in place by your twisted system.

I can't imagine what it must be like to have to suffer this torture for so long or to have to see your own child go through this.

If you do not release Rebecca you will become the subjects of an international investigation and very likely held criminally liable for her death which will no doubt occur under your watch. The only chance she has at survival and the only chance you have to save face is to release her and let her make her own path before the drugs kill her.

I hope that you will choose the right thing and let her go.

I will be forwarding the information on your abuses to many people and if necessary I will alert the many media contacts that I have acquired over the past few years. Do the right thing and avoid a scandal and the dismantling of your career by the governments who will hold you accountable for your actions.

To have such power as to play with people's lives this way and let the torture continue for 30 years, I have to really wonder what kind of people you are. If you do not act now to free her, you are not good people. If you let her go you can have at least a semblance of a clean conscience.If I do not receive a reply from you indicating that Rebecca is being released within the next few days, I will assume that you want the attention of the international human rights community and cameras at your doorsteps.

Hopefully she will survive the next few days and live on to be enabled to have the freedom that we are all born expecting to have.

Sincerely,
Amy Philo
amyphilo@yahoo.com