The Ashton Manual · BenzoIsland Forum
The Ashton Manual · BenzoIsland Forum
Benzodiazepine Addiction,
Withdrawal & Recovery
LATEST NEWS - July 4, 2010
Ministers declare war on Britain's tranquilliser crisis
The Independent on Sunday, July 4, 2010
Petition to the FDA Requesting Amendments
to Benzodiazepine Labeling · More Details
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AVAILABLE ONLINE:
Benzodiazepines: How They Work
and How to Withdraw
by Professor C H Ashton DM, FRCP
THE ASHTON MANUAL IN OTHER LANGUAGES
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This web site is dedicated to sufferers of iatrogenic benzodiazepine tranquilliser addiction everywhere. Launched on July 6, 2000 with a dozen pages this site now has more than 1180 pages of articles and information, expert medical documents, news stories and personal accounts. You can navigate this site from the side frame to the left or from the dropdown menu below. A good place to begin is the FAQ Document – "Benzodiazepine Dependency and Withdrawal Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) file".
For the best and most up-to-date information on benzodiazepine withdrawal you are encouraged to read: "Benzodiazepines: How they Work & How to Withdraw" (The Ashton Manual) by Professor C Heather Ashton, DM, FRCP, Revised August 2002. Versions of the Ashton Manual in French, German, Spanish, Italian, Polish, Finnish, Danish and Swedish can be accessed from this page.
For online benzodiazepine withdrawal support you may like to apply to join BenzoIsland.Org which is a private benzodiazepine withdrawal support group and full membership is strictly by application and approval.
IMPORTANT NOTICE: Any advice given on this site should not be substituted for the advice of a physician who is well-informed about benzodiazepine addiction and withdrawal. All advice given here is therefore to be followed at your own risk. You are advised never to stop taking any medication abruptly.
Please also note this is a personal web site and its owner has no connections with any organisations or support groups. Here are some of your comments about this web site and a review by Dr James Cave of Clinnix.net.
Ray Nimmo · UK
2000 - 2010
"Benzos are responsible for more pain, unhappiness and damage than anything else in our society." – Phil Woolas MP, Deputy Leader of the House of Commons, Oldham Chronicle, February 12, 2004. More Quotations »»
"The story of benzodiazepines is of awesome proportions and has been described [by David Blunkett MP] as a national scandal. The impact is so large that it is too big for Governments, regulatory authorities and the pharmaceutical industry to address head on, so the scandal has been swept under the carpet." - Phil Woolas MP, House of Commons Hansard Debates, December 7, 1999. More Quotations »»
"The biggest drug-addiction problem in the world doesn't involve heroin, cocaine or marijuana. In fact, it doesn't involve an illegal drug at all. The world's biggest drug-addiction problem is posed by a group of drugs, the benzodiazepines, which are widely prescribed by doctors and taken by countless millions of perfectly ordinary people around the world... Drug-addiction experts claim that getting people off the benzodiazepines is more difficult than getting addicts off heroin... For several years now pressure-groups have been fighting to help addicted individuals break free from their pharmacological chains. But the fight has been a forlorn one. As fast as one individual breaks free from one of the benzodiazepines another patient somewhere else becomes addicted. I believe that the main reason for this is that doctors are addicted to prescribing benzodiazepines just as much as patients are hooked on taking them. I don't think that the problem can ever be solved by gentle persuasion or by trying to wean patients off these drugs. I think that the only genuine long-term solution is to be aware of these drugs and to avoid them like the plague. The uses of the benzodiazepines are modest and relatively insignificant. We can do without them. I don't think that the benzodiazepine problem will be solved until patients around the world unite and make it clear that they are not prepared to accept prescriptions for these dangerous products." - Dr Vernon Coleman, Life Without Tranquillisers, 1985. More Quotations »»
"It is more difficult to withdraw people from benzodiazepines than it is from heroin. It just seems that the dependency is so ingrained and the withdrawal symptoms you get are so intolerable that people have a great deal of problem coming off. The other aspect is that with heroin, usually the withdrawal is over within a week or so. With benzodiazepines, a proportion of patients go on to long term withdrawal and they have very unpleasant symptoms for month after month, and I get letters from people saying you can go on for two years or more. Some of the tranquilliser groups can document people who still have symptoms ten years after stopping." - Professor M H Lader, Royal Maudesley Hospital, BBC Radio 4, Face The Facts, March 16, 1999. More Quotations »»
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