The Dr. Peter Breggin Hour - 5.21.25

Methylene blue is widely marketed over the counter to the general public as well as to the natural health, health freedom, and freedom communities, often on the internet. It is flooding America.

 

Some sellers are touting methylene blue as a “miracle” tonic that improves “cognitive function”1 and boosts energy to previously unimagined heights. Some have given live demonstrations on TV and podcasts demonstrating how the oral form hyperactivates some people within 35 minutes of the first dose — a typical stimulant drug rush — which is actually a danger signal for potentially activating them into a dangerous manic episode during future exposures or even more deadly outcomes.

 

Read the full article here: Methylene Blue is highly neurotoxic to your brain and mind

 

In reality, methylene blue is a lethal neurotoxin, a poison to the brain. It has the same basic chemical composition and harmful clinical effects as the oldest and most neurotoxic “antidepressants,” the monoamine oxidase inhibitors (MAOIs). It also has similarities to the neurotoxic phenothiazine “antipsychotic” drugs, including the original Thorazine (chlorpromazine), but methylene blue is more stimulating or activating.

 

Methylene blue is not a miraculous new discovery. It is the opposite. Created in 1876 in a lab — it is the oldest manmade chemical to be used in medicine. But in well over a century, methylene blue has never been FDA-approved for psychiatric purposes. Later, its chemical structure was modified in labs for creating many of the earliest, most neurotoxic psychiatric drugs.

 

Methylene blue suppresses or destroys forms of the enzyme monoamine oxidase that are used by the brain for controlling or modulating four different powerful neurotransmitters — serotonin, dopamine, norepinephrine, and epinephrine. In short, by crushing monoamine oxidase, methylene blue causes overstimulation of four of the brain’s major neurotransmitters, all of which profoundly impact the mind.

 

After the FDA was created in 1906, methylene blue was grandfathered into the market by the agency as an obscure antidote for methemoglobinemia, but it must be emphasized that the FDA has never tested the safety of methylene blue for any purpose. Furthermore, the FDA, based on its adverse reporting system and scientific reports, has published serious warnings about potentially lethal adverse reactions from methylene blue, especially when combined with numerous other drugs.2

 

The first MAOIs used as depressants were derived from methylene blue, and they turned out to be so toxic that the first two were quickly taken off the market by the FDA. One caused lethal liver disease, and the other caused hypertensive crises. Methylene blue is known to impair liver function tests and to cause hypertensive crises. Early on, all MAOIs were removed for a while from the international list of approved drugs. Please go to this endnote in my report  for a list of historical and scientific studies about the extraordinary history and the nature of methylene blue and the other MAOIs.3

 

Psychiatry and the psychopharmaceutical complex are so driven to impose neurotoxins upon our brains ⎯ some MAOI antidepressants remain on the market today. FDA Full Prescribing Information for the existing MAOI antidepressants, readily available online,4 provides quick access to the kinds of adverse effects caused by methylene blue. These FDA documents also provide lists of the foods and of some of the many, many drugs you cannot take with MAOIs, like methylene blue, without risking death from serotonin syndrome or a hypertensive crisis.

 

Meanwhile, all of America is being made a market for the original mother of them all, methylene blue, without requiring a prescription, with bizarrely distorted claims, and with unlimited supplies handed out as easily as a new caffeinated soda.

 

All of the three approved MAOIs, as well as methylene blue, carry repeated warnings at the FDA and in the scientific community about causing the two potentially crippling and lethal outcomes, serotonin syndrome and malignant hypertension (see below). These potentially lethal outcomes, as with all MAOIs, become much more serious and higher risk when methylene blue is taken with certain foods such as cheese and bananas, or literally with so many other drugs that it is impossible to memorize them or to keep track of them.

 

Here is one version of a short summary of the long list of dangerous interactions between MAOIs, including methylene blue, and other drugs and foods, taken from Goodman and Gilman’s The Pharmacological Basis of Therapeutics (2018, p. 274):

 

Monoamine Oxidase Inhibitors

 

Serotonin syndrome is the most serious drug interaction for the MAOIs (see Adverse Effects). The most common cause of serotonin syndrome in patients taking MAOIs is the accidental coadministration of a SHT reuptake-inhibiting antidepressant or tryptophan. Other serious drug interactions include those with meperidine and tramadol. MAOIs also interact with sympathomimetics such as pseudoephedrine, phenylephrine, oxymetazoline, phenylpropanolamine, and amphetamine; these are commonly found in cold and allergy medication and diet aids and should be avoided by patients taking MAOIs. Likewise, patients on MAOIs must avoid foods containing high levels of tyramine: soy products, dried meats and sausages, dried fruits, home-brewed and tap beers, red wine, pickled or fermented foods, and aged cheeses.

 

I am presenting this detailed summary in the hope of gaining the immediate attention of people and businesses who are promoting methylene blue and anyone who is unfortunately taking it. Please share this summary or the entire document as widely as possible and with proper attribution.

 

An extensive article follows, detailing my professional experience in the arena of psychopharmacology. It includes a lengthy scientific analysis with more than two dozen endnotes containing an even greater number of scientific citations.

 

Read the full article here: Methylene Blue is highly neurotoxic to your brain and mind

 

End Notes

 

1 All stimulants from caffeine to Ritalin (methylphenidate) and on to methamphetamine and cocaine, and including MAOIs, can produce subjective feelings of improved concentration or memory, and some short-term studies show a brief improvement. This is caused by obsessive-compulsive mental focusing and is driven by a narrowing of general awareness and judgment.  No FDA-approved stimulants, for example, have been proven to help cognition or academic performance, and all harm the brain long-term.  Here is a study that is negligent in its claims and its lack of warnings about methylene blue that may have encouraged the current epidemic use: https://psychiatryonline.org/doi/full/10.1176/appi.pn.2016.pp8a5 I have researched these issues in multiple scientific papers and books, including Brain-Disabling Treatments in Psychiatry: Drugs, Electroshock, and the Psychopharmaceutical Complex, second edition (2008).  For an easily accessible, comprehensive look at stimulant drug effects, also see my free resource center on children and stimulant medications: https://breggin.com/Childrens-Resources-Center

 

2 Drug Safety Communication: Serious CNS reactions possible when methylene blue is given to patients taking certain psychiatric medications | FDA and FDA Drug Safety Communication: Updated information about the drug interaction between methylene blue and Drug Safety Podcasts > FDA Drug Safety Podcast for Healthcare Professionals: Updated information about the drug interaction between methylene blue and serotonergic psychiatric medications (methylthioninium chloride) and serotonergic psychiatric medications | FDA and much more comprehensive coverage of methylene blue adverse effects with special warnings for professionals can be found at Methylene Blue Monograph for Professionals – Drugs.com

 

3 Half_a_century_of_antidepressant_drugs_-20151101-21548-vmvosk-libre.pdf. Also see Methylene Blue: The Long and Winding Road From Stain to Brain: Part 2 – PubMed and Methylene Blue in the Treatment of Neuropsychiatric Disorders – PubMed; and Iproniazid | Antidepressant, Monoamine Oxidase Inhibitor & Mental Health | Britannica; Methylene Blue: The Long and Winding Road From Stain to Brain: Part 2 – PubMed; Monoaminergic neurotransmission: the history of the discovery of antidepressants from 1950s until today – PubMed. These cover the fascinating history of MAOIs and Methylene Blue. 

 

4 The currently approved MAOI antidepressants are phenelzine (Nardil), tranylcypromine (Parnate), selegiline (Eldpryl, Emsam, Zelapar)), and isocarboxazid (Marplan).

 

 

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Learn more about Dr. Peter Breggin's work: https://breggin.com/

 

See more from Dr. Breggin's long history of being a reformer in psychiatry: https://breggin.com/Psychiatry-as-an-Instrument-of-Social-and-Political-Control

 

Psychiatric Drug Withdrawal, the how-to manual @ https://breggin.com/a-guide-for-prescribers-therapists-patients-and-their-families/

 

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