Thursday, September 06, 2007

Predictable

This is why I get so irritated at those among us who condemn the use of psychotropic drugs in persons of any age. It is so easy to think that we are over medicating people, especially children. It is also easy to condemn people for needing help with depression. I am no friend of either the medical industry or big pharma, but to deny the need for these medications is stupid. I would also say that the lack of trained professionals in child psychology in rural areas of the country leads to the use of medications without the concurrent talk therapy. To those of you who think we are over medicating, I'd advise you to talk to the family of one of the dead children.
In the year after the change in labeling, the suicide rate rose 14% among those younger than 19, the largest increase since the government started collecting suicide statistics in 1979, said biostatistician Robert D. Gibbons and his colleagues at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

A similar drop in prescriptions in the Netherlands led to a 49% increase in youth suicides over a two-year period, the team reported. They estimated that every 20% drop in antidepressant use among all ages in the U.S. would lead to a nearly 10% increase in suicides, an additional 3,040 deaths per year

My emphasis.

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