Politics, profit, and psychiatric diagnosis: A case study of tobacco use disorder

L.D. Hirshbein

American Journal of Public Health, 2014, vol. 104, issue 11, 2076-2084

Abstract: The idea of tobacco or nicotine dependence as a specific psychiatric diagnosis appeared in 1980 and has evolved through successive editions of the American Psychiatric Association's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual. Not surprisingly, the tobacco industry attempted to challenge this diagnosis through behind-the- scenes influence. But another entity put corporate muscle into supporting the diagnosis - the pharmaceutical industry. Psychiatry's ongoing professional challenges have left it vulnerable to multiple professional, social, and commercial forces. The example of tobacco use disorder illustrates that mental health concepts used to develop public health goals and policy need to be critically assessed. I review the conflicting commercial, professional, and political aims that helped to construct psychiatric diagnoses relating to smoking. This history suggests that a diagnosis regarding tobacco has as much to do with social and cultural circumstances as it does with science. © 2014, American Public Health Association Inc. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders; drug industry; economics; history; history; human; organization and management; politics; tobacco industry; Tobacco Use Disorder; United States, Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders; Drug Industry; History, 20th Century; Humans; Politics; Tobacco Industry; Tobacco Use Disorder; United States (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2014
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:aph:ajpbhl:10.2105/ajph.2014.302125_6

DOI: 10.2105/AJPH.2014.302125

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