Chapter 3 of Robert Whitaker’s book, Anatomy of an Epidemic, is
fairly short and begins his discussion of the history of
psychopharmacology and the changes it brought to the practice of
psychiatry. Much of this section seems to revolve around the
concept of the “magic bullet.” Mr. Whitaker begins his chapter
by recounting the discovery of early antibiotics and the
realization that medications could be created that had more
toxicity some cells and less for others. He quotes Ehrlich with
what I assume will be his definition of a “magic bullet”: “If we
picture an organism as infected by a certain species of
bacterium, it will be easy to effect a cure if substances have
been discovered which have a specific affinity for these
bacteria and act on these alone. (If) they possess no affinity
for the normal constituents of the body, such substances would
then be magic bullets.” Now, what are we to make of this idea?
We need to see if Mr. Whitaker believes that magic bullets exist
as described by Ehrlich or if he harbo