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Guillermou's avatar

Alarming evidence from a British study shows that the Prozac class of antidepressants can cause healthy men, women, and children with no history of depression to experience suicidal thoughts.

The research undermines claims by Eli Lilly, the makers of Prozac, that people who commit suicide while taking the pill do so because of their depression and that the illness, not the medication, is to blame.

Their findings are particularly worrying given the growing number of people, including children, who are being prescribed these drugs by their GPs for mild depression and who are not clinically seriously ill.

Prozac, the miracle pill of the 1980s and 90s, became the biggest-selling drug in pharmaceutical history, prescribed to more than 38 million people worldwide. It became a metaphor for late 20th-century life and a cult in its own right, enshrined in a book titled "Prozac Nation."

What began as a medication for those suffering from clinical depression has been transformed by overuse and demand into a pill for minor ailments.

But while this "happiness drug" may be considered a cure-all for a significant number of people, it can drive them to the brink of despair. A study conducted by David Healy, head of the Department of Psychological Medicine at North Wales, reveals the true dangers of some SSRIs (selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors), as Prozac and its imitators are known. It was found that two out of every 20 healthy volunteers taking a Prozac-class antidepressant called Lustral (or Zoloft in the US) became dangerously suicidal.

Fluoxetine can cause agitation, irritability, or abnormal behavior in some adolescents and young adults. It can also cause suicidal thoughts and tendencies or increased depression in some individuals. Difficulty breathing, chest pain, confusion, diarrhea, dizziness or lightheadedness, rapid heart rate, headache, increased sweating, muscle pain, nausea, restlessness, runny nose, difficulty sleeping, tremors, unusual tiredness or weakness, changes in vision, or vomiting; increased risk of bleeding; may cause hyponatremia.

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2000/may/22/drugs.uknews

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https://www.drugs.com/sfx/fluoxetine-side-effects.html

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s12888-024-06293-y (2024).--

https://www.mdpi.com/2673-7051/5/1/5 (2025).--

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Guillermou's avatar

In general, there are several culprits behind the overuse of antidepressants: social media with its dangerous messages reflecting a decadent society, allopathic medicine associated with pharmaceutical profits, and insufficiently educational and protective parental control. Social media trends and peer pressure can be a dangerous combination for children and their friends, especially when it comes to the misuse of medication. Research has shown that young adults who use social media are three times more likely to suffer from depression, putting a large portion of the population at risk of suicidal thoughts and behaviors.

If a child is starting to focus too much attention on social media at the expense of real-life interactions, parents should be concerned. At a minimum, this should trigger a conversation about the behaviors to ensure that there aren't more serious problems underway, such as bullying, anxiety, or other issues.

The truth is that the science of antidepressants leads to more depression and all sorts of actions against life and moral integrity. The explicit use of psychiatric drugs has no conclusive effect on the illness being treated, but it does have side effects and can lead to dependence. The manifestations of an underlying pathology should be analyzed through an individualized assessment of the illness, considering the nature, context, and origin of each person's particular emotional and behavioral difficulties. Drugs commonly called antidepressants produce a short-term mood elevation, but they require increased dosages to maintain this effect and cause dysphoria when discontinued. No known substance appears capable of producing a long-term mood elevation, which hints at the misleading nature of the term "antidepressant."

The fact that medications such as antidepressants and antipsychotics are prescribed for increasingly longer periods is especially concerning. This is concerning given the serious adverse consequences associated with the long-term use of drugs like antipsychotics, including cardiac complications, metabolic dysfunction, and neurological damage such as tardive dyskinesia.

Of the approximately 800 million people worldwide with a mental disorder, depression and anxiety are the most common, and both represent a significant burden of disability. Over the past decade, the number of U.S. adults receiving mental health treatment has steadily increased, reaching nearly 55.8 million in 2023.

A very representative chart of antidepressant consumption worldwide.

https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/antidepressants-per-capita

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