Mad, mad world

It’s amusing to see the camps of the ex-besties daring each other to have their heads examined, and to undergo follicle drug testing.

They should all go ahead and take the test, and make a full public disclosure of the results.

People have always wanted top public officials to disclose their health status, both physiological and mental.

Some Philippine presidents have been open about their physiological health condition. But because such matters can impact political fortunes, most have not been forthcoming, especially during election campaigns, when such information can affect voter preferences.

The first Ferdinand Marcos kept his systemic lupus erythematosus and regular kidney dialysis a national security secret. Today, while SLE still has no cure, there are treatments available for the symptoms, so it may no longer warrant that kind of secrecy.

In 2002, Bongbong Marcos publicly admitted for the first time that he donated a kidney to his father in 1983.

Resistance to public disclosure is greater for the state of mental health and for sexually transmitted diseases. Mental health issues have also been used to denigrate political aspirations, although the tack doesn’t seem to work. Miriam Defensor Santiago laughed off descriptions of her as “brain-damaged” (“Brenda daw ako!” she would tell journalists with a chuckle). In 2010, Noynoy Aquino shrugged off rumors about his mental health problems, winning the presidency by a landslide.

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Rodrigo Duterte publicly disclosed his battles with Buerger’s disease, Barrett’s esophagus, myasthenia gravis, and pain from a motorcycle spill that made his doctor prescribe him the powerful and addictive opioid fentanyl. But he brushed off the disclosure of a psychological assessment that he underwent in 2000 when his marriage to Elizabeth Zimmerman was annulled on the basis of psychological incapacity.

It’s true that psychological incapacity, whether real or merely a manufactured excuse, is commonly cited as a reason for seeking marriage annulment in this hypocritical land that frowns on divorce. The assessment was also bared by detractors during Duterte’s campaign for the presidency in 2016.

Still, the assessment result is chilling when you consider what happened when Duterte became president: he was deemed to have “Antisocial Narcissistic Personality Disorder,” which the psychologist said makes him prone to humiliating people and violating their rights. He was also assessed to be impulsive, with difficulty controlling his emotions.

“For all his wrongdoings,” the assessment stated, “he tends to rationalize and feel justified. Hence, he seldom feels a sense of guilt or remorse.”

When the psychiatric report was leaked, Zimmerman said her ex-husband was actually “down-to-earth and practical and kind-hearted.”

As for Duterte’s successor, rumors of substance abuse have hounded Bongbong Marcos since his father was president. If the rumors are true and BBM has kicked the habit, it would inspire many others to do the same, if he can come out in the open about his struggle and acknowledge it as a health and social problem. It could broaden public understanding of the issue and perhaps make police hesitate in executing drug users.

Instead, BBM’s camp has seized on the press conference of his non-friend Vice President Sara Duterte to try to turn the tables on the clan that keeps referring to him as a cocaine addict. Her “Drag Me to Hell press con” is being portrayed as a meltdown and the VP unhinged and needing to consult a shrink.

Truly, these former friends deserve each other.

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Meanwhile, October being National Mental Health Awareness Month (Oct. 10 is observed as World Mental Health Day), let’s hope this mutual political gaslighting won’t trivialize the gravity of mental health problems and drug addiction.

Mental health disorders are life-debilitating and seriously life-threatening. Suicide is on the rise particularly among the youth worldwide. The latest high-profile example is, sadly, one of my favorite singer-songwriters, Liam Payne, who battled depression and drug addiction. He reportedly had multiple drugs including cocaine in his system when he jumped to his death from a hotel balcony in Argentina. This holiday season, I will be playing on the piano his lovely, melancholy “All I Want (for Christmas)” – and no, it’s not about his two front teeth.

The use of mental health issues to insult political opponents could reinforce the stigma that’s still attached to psychological problems in our country, preventing people – particularly youths – from seeking professional help.

It would actually be interesting to find out what the assessments might be in case the political foes accept each other’s dare and undergo psychiatric testing.

The international psychiatric community has a list of over 200 mental disorders. Going through them, you will see that no one will be spared from falling under some form of mental affliction. As of June 2022, the World Health Organization estimated that one in every eight people on the planet was living with a mental disorder – some 970 million.

The list includes bereavement, “anxiety disorders” that afflict an estimated 40 million adults in America alone, and eating and substance-related disorders, which include drug abuse, nicotine dependence and “caffeine intoxication.”

Also listed are addictions to sex, porn, the internet, social media, video games, gambling, and even food and shopping.

Somewhere on that long list should be a mental disorder associated with insatiable greed for power and wealth. That could qualify nearly all politicians in this country for the nuthouse.

It would be hilarious, except that mental health problems are no laughing matter.