Anti-Depressant Use Down Among Kids

Is anyone surprised by this? Prescriptions for anti-depressants are way down--as much as 25 percent--among kids, following revelations that some anti-ds caused suicidal ideation, if not suicide, in teens and other youngsters. We'll see if there's any connection with suicide rates as soon as the 2003 figures come out from the feds. The black box warnings were issued in 2004, but concerns about the meds were widely circulated in 2003.

Of course, this begs the whole question of whether prescriptions have gone down among adults and whether these same meds have led to suicidality in adults. The media and regulators always lavish attention on teens when it comes to mental illness--a dynamic I've never understood--but my guess is that the black box warnings have given a lot of adults pause. My own personal survey of one reveals that Prozac made me suicidal as hell. I stopped taking anti-ds in 1995, began taking them again in 2000 (Wellbutrin), switched to Lexapro in late 2002 and stopped taking it in 2003. Both Wellbutrin and Lexapro proved ineffective in buffering me against all depression, so what would my incentive be to continue taking them? More to come.