Brown ‘the depressive’: Ward offers more ammo

Last Friday, the Mole sniffed out a blog posted by John Ward which argued pretty convincingly that there are strong indications Gordon Brown has been prescribed very strong drugs used to control both depression and obsessive compulsive disorder.

Ward, who blogs on notbornyesterday.org, argued that a precise diet recently given to Brown by his doctor - and revealed accidentally to Ward by a senior civil servant who works closely with the PM - was the giveaway.

Top of the list of banned foods said to have been given to the PM were cheese, Chianti and over-ripe avocados - which also just happen to be three of the top items forbidden to anyone prescribed anti-depressants called Mono Amine Oxidase Inhibitors (MAOIs).

Not surprisingly, Ward claims to have received quite a bit of mail over the past few days - some of it rude, but some of it from senior doctors agreeing with his prognosis.

Taking his theory further, Ward is now back online addressing the issue of two of Brown's most famous physical tics - "the clenching of the jaw and the oddly protruding tongue tic that often accompanies it".

Ward has discovered that both these characteristics are common in people taking anti-depressants of any kind. If you Google "side effects of anti-depressants", he points out, you'll find that "jaw-clenching is pretty much ever-present".

But surely Brown has been doing that thing with his jaw ever since he became a public figure, the Mole asked Ward this morning.

"That's right," said Ward. "My point is, bruxism [the medical term for jaw-clenching] is something he has suffered from anyway. But anti-depressants, including the normal SSRIs [selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors], would exacerbate the condition.

"It is only in the past two or three years that there have been reports that Brown's bruxism is bad enough that he's had to seek orthodental advice. This suggests he has been prescribed an SSRI anti-depressant for some time, which is what you'd expect if his doctor was now prescribing one of the more serious MAOIs."

If Brown is on an MAOI drug, says Ward, he can expect the jaw-clenching to become more of a problem. He quotes from a professional site about the MAOI Phenelzine, the laboratory term for the branded leader in this drug class, Nardil, which states: "Extrapyramidal effects include acute dystonic reactions such as protruding tongue, muscular contractions and clenched jaw".

Ward concludes his new blog by saying that he does not know for certain that Brown is definitely taking Nardil or any other antidepressant: "I am merely reporting the existence and widespread confirmation among the UK's informed elite that the PM does so....and that the smoke signals leading to this conclusion are now very thick indeed."

Hmmmph.