Why the HHS and RFK Jr. should focus on electrochemical psychiatry, not medications, therapy, DSM-5-TR

By David Stéphen 

There is a recent [May 5, 2026] report on MedPage Today, RFK Jr. Launches Effort to Encourage Antidepressant Deprescribing, stating that, “Clinicians need to do more to help wean patients off of antidepressants, according to HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. “Psychiatric medicines have a role in care, but we will no longer treat them as the default,” Kennedy said at the event.”

“However, he added, physicians will often say that the withdrawal effects “are the original symptom reasserting itself; you need to get back on the SSRI,” and it becomes a lifetime cycle.”

”However, “while APA supports efforts to improve the quality, safety, and evidence base of mental health treatment, we strongly object to framing the nation’s mental health crisis as primarily a problem of ‘overmedicalization’ or ‘overprescribing.’ That characterization oversimplifies a complex crisis and ignores the larger reality: too many patients cannot access timely, comprehensive care, while care remains unevenly distributed across our health system,” the group added.”

“The APA, along with five other psychiatric and psychopharmacology groups, also spoke out a year ago regarding the safety of antidepressants and other psychiatric medications.”

“Protect Our Care, a nonprofit organization whose mission is to make “high-quality, affordable, and equitable healthcare a right, and not a privilege,” panned the announcement from HHS.”

How does the human mind work to explain mental disorders, addictions, side-effects and withdrawal effects?

In psychiatry, everyone seems to be fighting about what they don’t know. If someone that is addicted to an illegal drug for over a decade has a lived experience, and someone that has studied the area too has knowledge of processes, who is not the expert?

How does the mind work, to at least, chart a model of what mental disorders are exactly?

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services [HHS] does not have a model of how the human mind works, even conceptually, to explain, map or measure mental disorders, addictions, therapy, side-effects and withdrawal effects.

American Society of Clinical Psychopharmacology [ASCP] does not have a model of how the human mind works, even conceptually, to explain, map or measure mental disorders, addictions, therapy, side-effects and withdrawal effects.

American College of Neuropsychopharmacology [ACNP] does not have a model of how the human mind works, even conceptually, to explain, map or measure mental disorders, addictions, therapy, side-effects and withdrawal effects.

American Association of Chairs of Departments of Psychiatry [AACDP] does not have a model of how the human mind works, even conceptually, to explain, map or measure mental disorders, addictions, therapy, side-effects and withdrawal effects.

American Psychiatric Association [APA] does not have a model of how the human mind works, even conceptually, to explain, map or measure mental disorders, addictions, therapy, side-effects and withdrawal effects.

National Network of Depression Centers [NNDC] do not have a model of how the human mind works, even conceptually, to explain, map or measure mental disorders, addictions, therapy, side-effects and withdrawal effects.

Society of Biological Psychiatry [SOBP] does not have a model of how the human mind works, even conceptually, to explain, map or measure mental disorders, addictions, therapy, side-effects and withdrawal effects.

It does not help much fighting clueless, especially as opacity in psychiatry is felt everyday across the United States. Even now, there is problem gambling, then AI psychosis and delusion, amid existing cases of unknowns in neurology due to the lack of a major model of the human mind.

The human mind, from conceptual brain science, to measure mental health

In neuroscience, all evidence says that neurons are directly involved in the mechanism of all functions, that makes the brain coordinate human life and experiences.

However, when neurons do so, they do with their electrical and chemical signals. Neurons, as cells, are not as anatomically varied as possible to represent all the functions of mind.

This means that if there is to be a postulation that is empirically-supported, it would mean that the basis of functions are electrical and chemical signals.

Now, since neurons are in clusters, it can be theorized that electrical and chemical signals are in sets and this is how they mechanize functions.

There is an immersive in Nature, What’s so special about the human brain?, stating that, “When comparing gene expression across species, many differences turn out to be related to how the connections between neurons — called synapses — connect with and signal to each other.”

There is an article in STAT, Researchers are betting on cockroaches as the cure to elitism in neuroscience, stating that, “..how the brain uses chemical and electrical signals to process and respond to the world.” It also states that, “..neurophysiologists work to understand how the nervous system uses chemical and electrical signals to respond to different situations or begin a certain behavior.”

Conceptually, the human mind is the collection of all the electrical and chemical signals, with their interactions and attributes, in sets, in clusters of neurons, across the central and peripheral nervous systems. Simply, the human mind is the sets of signals.

A memory is a specific configuration or formation of electrical and chemical signals in a set. The same applies to an emotion, a feeling and the regulation of an internal signal.

Simply, functions like these are a result of interactions of signals, for specificity in configurations.

Also, there are states that electrical and chemical signals often are, in sets, at the time of the interaction, that become how those interactions are graded.

Attributes are states of signals at the time of interaction determining the extents of those interactions.

It is possible to describe every memory, feeling and emotion by this postulation. It moves from labels or descriptions, to likely parallels in the brain.

This postulate is established in Conceptual Biomarkers and Theoretical Biological Factors for Psychiatric and Intelligence Nosology.

Explaining mental disorders and addictions

Psychiatry is an electrochemical problem, at this time. So, explaining mental disorders for how electrical and chemical signals configure functions as well as adjust before, during and after episodes are a path to go.

This means that advancement beyond the DSM-5-TR is possible, such that labels are behind, and components with their mechanism are ahead for functions.

It does not matter much what the HHS, ASCP, ACNP, AACDP, NNDC, SOBP are for or against, the next step in psychiatry is to look beyond neurons, into the mind, for mechanisms of electrical and chemical signals, as biological factors, towards biomarkers as well as explanatory proximity in many cases.

If an addiction can be explained, or a mental disorder, using electrical and chemical signals, they can give measures of depth to experiences, as well as be able to warn of risks.