In an episode airing in March 2025, “Last Week Tonight with John Oliver” called for an end to the use of “excited delirium” as a cause of deaths in police custody. The segment cites PHR’s landmark 2022 report “Excited Delirium and Deaths in Police Custody,” which shows how the term is not a valid, independent medical or psychiatric diagnosis.
Excited delirium is “at best useless, and at worst, racist pseudoscience,” Oliver says.
Oliver also spotlights the role of Axon Enterprise, the maker of Tasers, in popularizing this dangerous and invalid term. Watch the segment above to learn more.
