Insider tips his hat to Ralph Faggotter at Healthy Skepticism for this insight:
So many people are now taking anti-depressants that aquatic animals are being poisoned by the antidepresant chemicals which we flush down the toilet and which ultimately make their way into rivers.
Why are so many people taking these drugs?
This article in Fortune provides some of the answers but fails to mention the world-wide push for people to complete depression screening questionnaires, which have a low threshold for coming up with the answer- " You are possibly depressed , see your doctor." - and seeing the doctor tends to lead to a script for anti-depressants.
There are many websites and government and non-government programs devoted to promoting these 'screening tests'.
Sometimes these programs are well-meaning but can't see the unfortunate effects of their activities ( like TeenScreen), other times they are funded by Big Pharma and have but one purpose in mind, which is to sell drugs ( like Texas Medication Algorithm Project) and sometimes they are somewhere in between (like Beyond Blue in Australia).
A black-box warning about suicidal thoughts and behavior in adults may very well be next, say a number of experts interviewed by FORTUNE. "I'm fully expecting that the same [risk found in young patients] will be found in adults," says Dr. Richard Kapit, an ex-FDA official who handled the agency's first safety review of Prozac before its approval in 1987.
In fact, last summer the FDA warned that several recent studies suggest that SSRIs and other antidepressants raise the risk of suicidal behavior in adults as well as kids. The agency added that it is reviewing "all available data" on the issue in an investigation expected to take a year or more.
Risk of suicide isn't the only problem dogging SSRIs. For example, GSK faces thousands of lawsuits on another side effect, severe withdrawal reactions to its drug Paxil, one of the fastest-acting SSRIs.
Recently British policymakers (NICE) moved to discourage the use of SSRIs to treat mild depression. And a recent scientific analysis has challenged long-held assumptions about how they work. That could undercut Big Pharmas' assertions that SSRIs are well understood, potentially increasing doubts about their safety.
Insiders' view: These issues are a ticking timebomb that could soon blow up in Big Pharmas face.
Future "fallout" problems (apart from the lawsuits) include: lower sales due to "black-box warnings" for adults as well as teens, increased pressure to stop DTC ads and finally it could also complicate Big Pharmas' efforts to roll out new antidepressants to replace current ones as the drugs go off patent.
Prozac anyone?
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