Breaking News: Charles Barber was quoted in the New York Times article on the "Mad Pride" movement.

Recent News: Charles Barber was on National Public Radio's FRESH AIR on April 24th, click here to listen.

From the author:
So far, the response to Comfortably Numb has been overwhelming. In recent days, I have been interviewed by the CBS Early Show, NPR's Fresh Air, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Newsweek, C-SPAN's Book TV, the San Francisco Chronicle, CBS Radio, the Hartford Courant, Fox Boston, Psychjourney, the Newark Star-Ledger, WIRED Magazine, Playboy, the Gary Null Show, and the San Francisco Chronicle, among many other outlets, about the book. In addition, I wrote an editorial on February 10th in The Washington Post; the response has been huge. I received 300 emails alone about that article.

~Charles Barber

Tour:

In the last few months, I have been on a national tour, reading and speaking in New York City, Boston, Seattle, San Francisco and Miami. Upcoming dates are in Chicago:

May 8 - WGN Radio Interview 2PM - Chicago

Future appearances in the summer and fall of 2008 are being scheduled in Delaware, Virginia, Nebraska, and New York. Dates and venues will be announced shortly.

Public perceptions of mental health issues have changed dramatically over the last fifteen years, and nowhere is this more apparent than in the rampant
over-medicalization of ordinary Americans. In 2006, 227 million antidepressant prescriptions were dispensed in this country, more than any other class of medication; in that same year, two-thirds of the money spent globally on
antidepressants was accounted for by the United States. In Comfortably Numb, Charles Barber provides a much-needed context for this disturbing phenomenon.

Barber explores the ways in which the drug companies first create a need for a drug and then rush to fill it, and he reveals the increasing pressure Americans are under to medicate themselves (direct-to-consumer advertising, fewer nondrug therapeutic options, the promise of the quick fix, the blurring of the distinction between mental illness and everyday problems). Most importantly, he convincingly argues that without an industry to push them, non-pharmaceutical approaches that could have the potential to help millions are tragically overlooked by a nation that sees drugs as an instant cure for all emotional difficulties.

Here is an unprecedented account of the impact of psychiatric medications on American culture and on Americans themselves.

Compelling. In Comfortably Numb, Barber brings a street-smart perspective ... He worked for years with [the homeless mentally ill] in New York ... Comfortably Numb has a degree of sardonic anger powering its torrent of data and case studies.
— Salon.com