Norwegian psychiatrist: Biden suffering from 'dementia,' worsening at 'galloping speed'

Joe Biden

Several psychiatrists have "diagnosed" President Trump's mental condition from afar.

Despite the fact that it's not an accepted practice, Bandy Lee, a Yale University psychiatrist, repeatedly has accused the president of being mentally deficient.

However, she has taken a hands-off approach to Democratic presidential hopeful Joe Biden, whose gaffes, angry outbursts and cognitive collapses are mounting.

For example, Biden lashed out at a Detroit voter, telling him, "You're full of s***." He also claimed to be running for Senate.

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Lee explained, however, regarding Biden, "I do not diagnose without examination and do not speak about public figures in general, unless there is evidence of such profound danger to public health and well-being because of serious signs of mental instability in a public servant, that it would be a public disservice not to share the knowledge and training that I have."

Now someone else has done the job for Lee.

Summit News reports Norwegian psychiatrist Fred Heggen believes Biden is suffering from dementia.

And it's getting worse at "galloping speed."

Heggen wrote an opinion piece published by the Norwegian online newspaper Nettavisen.

Heggen, the medical director at an Oslo clinic, explained: "Of course I may still judge him wrongly, but in my eyes he appears as a person who is already very affected by dementia. And the presidential election is still far ahead. What if his condition worsens further over the next two-three months?

"This is not scare propaganda on my part. Everyone who has had experience with people with dementia knows that a deterioration can come quickly and have a particularly dramatic course."

The psychiatrist said Biden's staff appears to be aware of the issue, noting he usually gives only short speeches.

Biden's gaffes go back years, but in recent months he even botched the Declaration of Independence, stating, "All men and women created by — you know, you know, the thing."

He also said that if voters don't like him, they can vote for "the other Biden."

Heggen speculated, "Nursing home next stop?"

Lee recently told Salon that Trump's preoccupation with his image amid the spread of the coronavirus is "putting lives at risk" and Vice President Pence is only "enabling" him.

Salon said Lee, who also teaches at Yale Law School, has spent the last three years "urging Congress to respond more forcefully to the dangers posed by what she sees as the president’s deteriorating mental health."

"Lee, who consults widely with state and foreign governments on public health approaches to violence prevention, urged the House Judiciary Committee to include a panel of mental health experts during Trump’s impeachment and called for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to request an involuntary 72-hour psychiatric hold of the president," Salon said.

The Legal Insurrection blog commented it has become "increasingly clear that Lee is using her position to influence politics for purely partisan reasons."

"How does the Yale administration justify this?"

Fox News analyst Brit Hume has said it's obvious that Biden is becoming "senile." And Donald Trump Jr. said Biden is showing signs of Alzheimer's.

Lee was among a group of psychiatrists who volunteered to diagnose Trump by long-distance. She urged House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to order the president into an "involuntary evaluation."

She said in a statement at the time that "hearing about mental health aspects in the context of the impeachment hearings is critical, partly because, for the past 2.5 years we have been very deeply concerned about mental instability of the president, and pretty much all that we have said has born (sic) out to be true."

In a subsequent interview with Salon, Lee raised the prospect of an "involuntary evaluation" of the president.

Pelosi, Lee claimed, "has the right" to force Trump into such a review.

"I am beginning to believe that a mental health hold ... will become inevitable," Lee told the publication.

Lee began making long-distance diagnostic evaluations of the president even before he was elected.

She later authored a book titled "The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump: 37 Psychiatrists and Mental Health Experts Assess a President."

Medical association ethics codes discourage doctors from discussing or diagnosing people they have not met in person.

In fact, the American Psychological Association maintains the "Goldwater Rule," which came about as a result of an attempt by various mental health practitioners to disparage Barry Goldwater's mental health during the 1964 presidential campaign.

It explains: "On occasion psychiatrists are asked for an opinion about an individual who is in the light of public attention or who has disclosed information about himself/herself through public media. In such circumstances, a psychiatrist may share with the public his or her expertise about psychiatric issues in general. However, it is unethical for a psychiatrist to offer a professional opinion unless he or she has conducted an examination and has been granted proper authorization for such a statement."

Authoritarian regimes such as the Soviet Union fine-tuned the political weaponization of psychiatry, confining many dissidents of sound mind to insane asylums for "involuntary evaluations" because of their political opposition.