Article: The mystery of 'needle spiking', social panics, and mass psychogenic illness

Sly Saint

Sly Saint

Senior Member (Voting Rights)
IT was freshers’ week at the end of September 2021 when management student Sarah Buckle headed to a nightclub in Nottingham with a group of friends.

The last thing the 19-year-old remembered was being at the bar around 11pm before she suddenly became unable to speak or stand up.

According to friends who got in a taxi to take her home she began “violently throwing up”, screaming, choking, and losing consciousness.

An ambulance was called and she was rushed to hospital. When she woke up the next day she described a throbbing pain in her left hand and a pin-prick puncture wound.
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The alleged incident was among thousands reported in cities across the UK and Europe - but, more than a year on, there is a growing sense that what really happened might be a form of psychological contagion.
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There are plenty of other examples of mass psychogenic illness - or what was once dismissively known an "hysteria".

In 2015, 40 pupils at a school Ripon, Lancashire had to be treated by emergency services for dizziness and nausea seemingly triggered by a wave of anxiety after four other children fainted during an Armistice Day service.

Such incidents are "incredibly common", said Simon Wessely, a psychiatrist and epidemiologist who first wrote about the subject in 1987.

He said: “It may be that someone faints, or has a fit, or a medical incident, and what then gets transmitted is anxiety.
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https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/23180081.needle-spiking-social-panics-psychogenic-illness/
 
'The last thing the 19-year-old remembered was being at the bar around 11pm before she suddenly became unable to speak or stand up.'

'The alleged incident was among thousands reported in cities across the UK and Europe - but, more than a year on, there is a growing sense that what really happened might be a form of psychological contagion.'



Oh great! Lets hope the thousands of young women whose drinks are spiked in clubs and pubs are not now suspected of having a 'form of psychological contagion' as well. Very recent case when a very disorientated, physically incapable, young woman was escorted out of the pub and left on the street alone by the club bouncers, who did not make the effort to find her friends who would have kept her safe and got her home.
 
I hope Sarah Buckle (the woman mentioned in the first post in the thread) doesn't end up with the "she's mad" diagnosis on her medical records. She'll find herself not getting treatment for anything for the rest of her life, unless she has a bone sticking out or some other visible medical problem. But clearly she had been spiked. But then she had the temerity to be female in a pub or club so what else could she expect. (sarcasm off)

It would seem there is a new problem for people to worry about after being spiked. New drugs may arise that hospitals can't identify, so the patient gets diagnosed as mentally ill.
 
The fact that "waves of anxiety" is not laughed out of every room it is said is a sad indictment of how poorly science is doing, how it's scientific thinking that is missing. Science isn't about giving answers, it's a process that allows finding answers. It's not just about outcomes, the entire process is critical to a useful outcome.

This stuff is folklore, confident claims by con artists that can never be verified. Literally the same process that "ghost hunters" TV shows do: what was that noise? No explanation. Must be ghosts! Can't be anything other than ghosts.

It's truly as if the idea of a naturalistic universe is not really accepted where it comes to illness. I've genuinely never heard anyone say anything about the "mind" or the brain being powerful other than in the context of trying to explain psychogenic illness. Literally the only context in which this is ever said. I'm sorry but having the power to create illness, but not anything else, not even happiness, is the absolute worst "power" anyone could possibly think of. It's basically the only "power" that is magically ascribed to the brain, everything else requires years and years of study and practice, including some of the stuff ascribed to it, like Buddhist monks raising their body temperature slightly through intense meditation.

It's frankly creepy that Wessely is actually willing to say this even given how well-known drink-spiking is. Frankly this is borderline giving cover to rapists, giving them a fake "expert" opinion that can dismiss any claim about this. Even though the problem is far worse than is publicly acknowledged. The worst thing to have happened to mental health is mental health professionals.
 
He said: “It may be that someone faints, or has a fit, or a medical incident, and what then gets transmitted is anxiety.
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How is this 'transmitted'? Is it via the telegraph or does one need high speed internet access?

Leaving aside the fact that there's no credible evidence to support the notion of mass psychogenic illness (it is an unfalsifiable hypothesis, ie, pseudo-science), this nonsense is horrifically misogynistic.

If anyone else made similar misogynistic claims, they would (quite rightly) be pilloried. However, being a doctor apparently allows you to make all sorts of sexist remarks and smears without any risk of censure.
 
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NelliePledge said:
He must live in a glass house
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Or maybe, a house of mirrors...

reflecting back to him his own mind in everything he sees.

Which to be fair is the nature of the human condition and is why we invented the scientific method, which the misapplication of the hypothesis of hysteria as if proven is not supported by, as it has not been proven with empirical evidence or compelling logic. Its just a bad guess off the top of his head.

A more plausible hypothesis especially among school children is a bug doing the rounds and causing illness with similar symptoms.

And a puncture wound is not evidence for psychosomatic hysteria and is evidence for criminal assault by another individual.

If he has a theory that it is otherwise, he must prove it with empirical data otherwise it is no more valid than any member of the public's opinion, less so if it flies in the face of common sense.

Nullius in verba.
 
Armistice is in November, the heating would have been on so a low level of carbon monoxide is always possible.

I never felt any anxiety about fainting because I thought it was a normal. I grew up in a newly built housing scheme and until the new church was built we had Mass in a small convent chapel. What with standing room only and fasting from midnight the night before there were men on duty at the back who helped every time someone fainted. It was usually women because they were in charge of getting the kids ready.

It was not anxiety as it was different people all the time.
 
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