Thousands of women in the UK may be taking antidepressants prescribed by their GPs without knowing that the pills, which are hard to stop taking, could cause birth defects in unborn children. The problems relate to a class of drug known as SSRIs (selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors), which includes Prozac and, in particular, the British-made Seroxat.
Fox News just informed viewers that 27 million Americans are being treated for depression. The Washington Times ran a three-part series this week on the tsunami of mental illness in New Orleans four years after Hurricane Katrina, mostly depression and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). A rash of additional articles has appeared nationwide on obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), including one from last Sunday’s (August 2) Washington Times “Pure suffering for OCD Patients,” by Cheryl Weinstein. All news sources, regardless of political persuasion, lend the aura of medical legitimacy to these phenomena.
Nearly every year, as part of the suicide prevention drug pushing racket, drug company shills publish a bogus study with claims that more people are dying from suicide due to a black box warning of an increased risk of suicide in young people on the labels of SSRI and SNRI antidepressants.
Between 1996 and 2005, Reuters reports, the use of anti-depressants doubled to nearly 10 percent of the American population. In 1996, the figure was 13 million. Now, it’s 27 million. Those numbers, obviously, should cause some worry. For one thing, the suicide rate for middle-aged people is rising, Reuters reported, suicide being a risk factor in taking antidepressants. According to the Journal of Preventative Medicine, the suicide rate for middle-aged Americans increased 16 percent from 1999 to 2008, which roughly coincides with the massive increase in anti-depressant use.
Antidepressant use among U.S. residents almost doubled between 1996 and 2005, along with a concurrent rise in the use of other psychotropic medications, a new report shows.