Since 1969, the Citizens Commission on Human Rights has worked steadfastly to educate the general public, community leaders and government officials about the abuses of the psychiatric profession. Perhaps nowhere have those abuses been more widespread than in Europe.

For CCHR volunteers across the continent, it has been an effort requiring courage and, at times, strong stomachs. For CCHR investigations have led to the discovery of grisly crimes, human rights violations and fraudulent activities, resulting in the criminal prosecution of hundreds of psychiatrists, psychologists and mental health workers.

CCHR representatives also regularly testify before official investigatory panels the world over, presenting reports, statistics and evidence of psychiatric abuse and malfeasance to government bodies, law enforcement agencies and the media. These actions prompt legislators and insurance companies to develop statutes and regulations, respectively, to protect individuals from psychiatric harm.

And CCHR works with many other like-minded groups, as well as investigative, legislative and judicial bodies, health departmentsand medical boards throughout EU member countries and around the world, to bring the psychiatric profession back under the law.

Thousands of French citizens are subjected to psychiatric electro-convulsive therapy (ECT), or shock treatment, every year. This barbaric treatment passes up to 460 volts of searing electric current through a victim’s head, causing harmful convulsions and severe brain damage. As a result, CCHR France has been inundated with tragic stories from people whose lives have been ruined by the procedure. In response, investigations have provided the necessary documentation to take effective action to stop the abuse. CCHR staff and volunteers have filed complaints against psychiatrists and their institutions with government agencies. The French chapter of CCHR has also acted as a civil party in suits to assist patients—still retained in psychiatric institutions—who were force-fed drugs, humiliated, beaten, restrained or raped.

The conditions within French psychiatric institutions have long been a source of concern, and the “involuntary commitment” laws by which the psychiatrists fill them is a lucrative source of government funds.