A NATION HOOKED ON HAPPY PILLS
GPs treble doses of anti-depressants as Britain heads towards top of world table
BRITAIN is becoming hooked on antidepressants, a global study suggests today.
Prescription rates have nearly trebled in 15 years, putting the UK fourth among 29 Western nations.
Britons take nearly twice as many of the ‘happy pills’ as counterparts in France, Italy and the Netherlands. Experts last night said patients were demanding a quick fix to avoid feeling down.
Others blamed GPs for fobbing off depressed patients with pills because waiting lists for indepth treatment were too long.
The UK rate of consumption for anti-depressants is 94.2 doses a day for every 1,000 inhabitants, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. This is up from 37.6 doses in 2000.
The research body’s study said patients were increasingly willing to ask for help, meaning every rich nation had seen a rise in use of drugs such as Prozac.
But it added: ‘There is significant variation in consumption of anti- depressants between
countries. Iceland reports the highest level in 2015, twice the OECD average, followed by Australia, Portugal and the United Kingdom.’
Carmine Pariante, a professor of biological psychiatry at King’s College London, said society was becoming less tolerant of emotional pain. ‘If you think of the way death or illness is represented in popular culture, we are trying to protect ourselves as much as possible from negative emotion,’ he added.
‘People are asking for anti-depressants in situations where perhaps a few years ago they would just wait.
‘There are people receiving antidepressants who ten years ago would not have asked for help and these are medications that can turn their lives around, so it’s good that more of them are being used.
‘But there’s also more people asking for anti-depressants as a quick fix because either they’re not used to feeling sad or less able to tolerate it, or we don’t have the resources or social support to get through difficult times.
‘Perhaps the message should be that these situations happen to everybody. We all have losses and there’s an element that brings progress and personal development, but we have to accept that feeling like crying for a few weeks is perfectly normal.’
Studies suggest that 10 per cent of adults are on anti-depressants and 8.3 per cent have a diagnosis of depression.
The Mail’s Good Health section has revealed that more than a million patients are needlessly given antidepressants or sedatives.
This includes an estimated 800,000 who have been taking anti-depressants for two years, many of whom were wrongly prescribed them.
James Davies, an expert in mental health at the University of Roehampton,
‘Getting the help they need’
claimed patients were given the drugs because waiting lists for therapy were too long.
He dismissed as a ‘ smokescreen’ the argument that pill use was rising because people were more willing to admit to mental health problems.
‘ More people are taking antidepressants because there is poor provision for alternatives,’ he said.
‘Waiting lists are still very long for psychological therapies, so doctors reach for their prescription pads instead. With one in ten people having to wait over a year to access therapy on the NHS – and the rest often waiting for many months – drugs become the only alternative.’
Dr Davies believes many are left on the drugs for years because doctors mistake the effects of withdrawal for depression, so patients are put back on the drugs.
He added: ‘Prescribing is also high because we are distributing them on a massive scale to people who, according to NICE guidelines, should not be receiving anti-depressants.
‘For example, according to the last comprehensive study, between one quarter and one half of people are being prescribed them for minimal depression.’
Professor Wendy Burn, president of the Royal College of Psychiatrists, dismissed this criticism. ‘Antidepressants are not happy pills,’ she said. ‘ They enable people to cope. They can give people strength to go to work, to see friends, to engage in therapy that will get them better.
‘Studies show that taking antidepressants reduces suicidal feelings in the severely depressed.
‘Rising anti- depressant prescriptions means more people getting the help they need. As a doctor specialising in mental health, I know they are an effective and evidence-based medication for moderate to severe epi-
sodes of depression.’ Professor Helen Stokes-lampard, who chairs the royal College of GPs, said the rise in anti-depressant use could be explained by patients being ‘less inhibited to seek medical help’.
But she added: ‘it also shines a light on the lack of alternative treatments in the community, such as talking therapies and CBT that we know can also greatly benefit our patients.’
There is growing concern among experts that doctors are ‘ over- medicalising’ patients and prescribing them drugs too easily. NHS figures this month showed that half of adults had taken a prescription drug during the past week.
in 2000, the UK was 7th in the table of anti-depressant use.
AS figures show hospitals are running at 90 per cent of capacity, there is little doubt the NHS is under very significant pressure.
The solution, according to the Royal College of GPs, is to discourage patients from coming forward. If ‘self-care’ doesn’t work, the college says that they should consult the NHS website or their pharmacist, and only then try to get a doctor’s appointment.
For most patients, who resort to their GP only in times of real need, an instruction to ‘think’ before picking up the phone will feel deeply patronising.
So instead of coming up with new ways to reduce their workload – with the risk that the genuinely ill don’t get the treatment their taxes pay for – the Mail suggests GPs’ leaders take a closer look at improving the supply side of the equation. Rather than closing on Wednesday afternoons – as many practices still do – they could stay open throughout the working week. And, if it’s not too radical a suggestion, they could even open on the weekend as well!