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Schizophrenics Daniel Frey, Managing Editor of New York City Voices and Fred Frese, Ph.D., first vice president of NAMI were featured on ABC's World News Tonight's "A Closer Look" segment on schizophrenia this past September Second.

The following is a transcript of their appearance...


Charles Gibson: "We're going to take 'A Closer Look' tonight at troubled minds. One of the most terrifying, debilitating and misunderstood types of mental illness is schizophrenia. About 2.5 million Americans suffer from the brain disease.

"It isn't a split personality as commonly thought. Rather, the symptoms include hearing voices, wild swings in behavior and the inability to interpret reality. ABC's John McKenzie tonight with some of the latest approaches to dealing with schizophrenia:

John McKenzie, ABC News (voice-over): The symptoms usually begin early, between the ages of 15 and 25. For Daniel Frey, they began last year, during his senior year at college. At first, there was the withdrawal from friends and family, then came the imaginary voices."

Daniel Frey: "All these voices, they were talking about me. Sometimes among themselves, they were talking about me and sometimes directly to me. I felt like the voices were saying, 'We're going to find you. We're going to get you.'"

Dr. Judith Rapoport, National Institute of Mental Health: "It can be dozens of voices. They typically tell them things like they are a bad person, that their body is deteriorating. They may tell them to go do terrible things.

John McKenzie (voice-over): "Occasionally, a patient will resort to violence. The man who opened fire on Capitol Hill last summer suffered from schizophrenia. But more likely, the violence is directed at themselves. Ten percent of schizophrenics commit suicide. (on camera): "Schizophrenia tends to run in families. And while no one knows exactly what causes the disease, new research has shown how it can permanently change the structure of a teenager's brain. (voice over): "How the brain becomes smaller, including the frontal lobe, an area responsible for coordinating emotion and thought. New research also reveals a difference in brain circuits, or synapses. During early childhood, a normal brain trims many unnecessary circuits, but in schizophrenia, the process appears excessive."

Dr. Judith Rapoport: "The schizophrenic patients that we're seeing in adolescence are pruning this at a stronger rate, at a faster rate, so that they're losing gray matter."

John McKenzie (voice-over): "Using that information, researchers at the Yale University School of Medicine are trying to intervene early, giving medications to teenagers at the very first sign of the disease."

Dr. Thomas McGlashan, Yale University School of Medicine: "We're trying to use the medications that we have now to control the symptoms to see if they can also, if given early enough, prevent the disorder altogether or to delay the onset of the disorder to later in life."

John McKenzie: "For Daniel Frey, the goal now is learning to live with the disease, learning to quiet the voices. John McKenzie, ABC News, New York."

Charles Gibson: "As John indicated, no one knows exactly what causes schizophrenia. And there is no cure. But with the right medication and therapy, about 60 percent of cases are treatable. Some people who battle the disease are still capable of remarkable achievements. ABC's Jackie Judd tonight on one man's struggle and success dealing with schizophrenia."

Jackie Judd, ABC News (voice-over): "Fred Frese calls his schizophrenic episodes his
'adventures.'"

Fred Frese: "Nobody wants to be a crazy person. I didn't want to be a crazy person. But I was locked up."

Jackie Judd (voice-over): "What followed were breakdowns, mixed with periods of extraordinary accomplishment."

Fred Frese: "It was exactly 12 years after I was committed as insane, I was promoted to be psychology director at Western Reserve Psychiatric Hospital. Yes, we can pass for normal some of the time, but we are never -- we should never confuse ourselves for being normal, because we're not.

"One of the things that many of us do is we talk to ourselves a lot. Sometimes I dance around the streets and that sort of thing. The neighbors I'm sure think I'm a little unusual. But this is much better than being locked up in a hospital."

Jackie Judd (voice-over): "As bad as the disease has been, there were times, Frese says, when the medicine was worse."

Fred Frese: "Well, for 33 years, I've been taking the medications. The side effects in those days were really awful. Akathesia is a thing meaning you can't sit down. So you have to walk all the time, pacing. In other words, forced walking."

"Or Dystonia, pulling your muscles back like that. My mouth will move involuntarily without my wanting it to."

Jackie Judd (voice-over): "The disease is something Frese's family has shared with him for better and for worse."

Fred Frese: "I do strange things around the house, and the kids are quite used to it. Sometimes they tell me they think it's kind of fun when it starts. It's almost like a party for them. But then, they also know not to invite friends over while -- particularly while Mommy's away if Daddy's home alone. It's probably not a good idea.

"You inherit a vulnerability for these disorders, and mental illnesses tend to run in families. Well, there were the kids. They're all on medication, and they have experiences.

Jackie Judd (voice-over): "It is a fact of life, of all of their lives, that the Freses have accepted. Still, it is hard."

Fred Frese: "We've been pathologized and ostracized and rejected by regular society, and they tend to give us labels like chronically mentally ill. But from our perspective, you are the ones who are chronically normal."

"It's going to change, because we're here and we're human beings, and we're not going to be quiet about being cast always as the monsters in the movies. It's a veil of silence beginning to be lifted."

Charles Gibson: "Schizophrenia, as you saw in Jackie Judd's report, is a very expensive illness. It costs as much as $48 billion in the U.S. each year. That total includes the cost of medical treatment, disability payments and wages lost because of the disease."