Are Antidepressants Powered More by Hope Than Chemistry?
Why children and adolescents should NEVER be prescribed an SSRI
Antidepressants are no better than placebo for children, teens and young adults - but exponentially more dangerous. That's the alarming truth the pharma-funded mainstream media refuses to report. This is why alternative media and podcasts are so critically important.
This publication will dare to expose the manipulated science and buried data that reveal these drugs are a massive fraud foisted on millions of families. From suicide risks to permanent sexual dysfunction, the uncensored facts about the pediatric pill pushing epidemic are too harrowing for corporate journalists to cover.
I want to thank Dr. Brett Deacon, a clinical psychologist from Australia for bringing to my attention a fascinating and groundbreaking new paper on the expectancy effect of antidepressant drugs for adolescent depression. For those who are unaware, a brief history lesson about the Treatment for Adolescent Depression Study (TADS) is essential to understanding how this study has shaped the landscape of prescribing antidepressants to minors.
Why Are We Prescribing SSRIs to Young People?
In 2004, the landmark Treatment for Adolescents with Depression Study (TADS) evaluated the effectiveness of the antidepressant fluoxetine, cognitive behavioral therapy, and their combination for treating major depression in adolescents.
When the TADS results were first published in 2004, the practice of prescribing SSRI antidepressants to children was already under intense scrutiny and "taking an evidence-based beating." That same year, the FDA held a hearing on increased suicide risks with SSRIs in youth, leading to a black box warning. An FDA official reported that in 12 of the 15 pediatric trials conducted prior, the SSRI had failed to outperform placebo - only fluoxetine (Prozac) had two positive studies.
Despite the lack of compelling evidence that fluoxetine (Prozac) is truly more effective or safer than other SSRI antidepressants in children and adolescents, this myth continues to be perpetuated by many medical professionals.
Critics argued even those sparse positive results were likely due to biased trial designs artificially inflating the drug effect over placebo response rates. An analysis in the British Medical Journal concluded the evidence for fluoxetine's efficacy in children "is not convincing," deeming any antidepressant recommendation for youth "inappropriate."
Despite the criticisms and concerns around SSRI antidepressants for pediatric use, the TADS study provided a key piece of evidence that has been widely cited to support medicating depressed youth with drugs like fluoxetine. Psychiatrists and pharmaceutical companies have pointed to TADS' conclusion that the combination of fluoxetine and cognitive behavioral therapy was most effective in treating adolescents with major depression.
This pivotal finding has served as justification for prescribing fluoxetine and other antidepressant medications as a frontline treatment, even in young patients under 18 facing greater risks. The medical community has leaned heavily on TADS as reassurance of the benefits of antidepressants for adolescent depression when used in conjunction with therapy.
The TADS results have been wielded as a powerful tool by pharmaceutical companies seeking to expand their market share and increase profits, often at the expense of vulnerable young patients. The study's findings have been used to downplay concerns about the risks of antidepressants in minors, including increased suicidality, and to promote a one-size-fits-all approach to treatment that prioritizes medication over psychotherapy and other non-pharmacological interventions.
Moreover, the influence of TADS has extended beyond psychiatry, shaping public perceptions and policy decisions around adolescent mental health care. The study's results have been used to argue for increased funding for antidepressant prescriptions and to push for more aggressive screening and treatment of depression in schools and primary care settings.
TADS has been instrumental in creating a climate in which the use of antidepressants in minors is not only accepted but actively encouraged, despite growing evidence of their limitations and potential for harm.
The Suicide Scandal
The TADS study providing justification for prescribing antidepressants to youth was not without major safety concerns. There was an increased risk of suicidal events in the fluoxetine group compared to placebo - a disturbing red flag that initially hovered over the trial results. However, this suicide risk issue was downplayed and essentially dismissed in subsequent reports from the NIMH-funded investigators.
It wasn't until 2009, when researcher Göran Högberg scrutinized the data, that the true scope of this concealed safety problem came to light. Högberg's analysis revealed how the TADS team had obscured and finessed the suicide risk data, keeping the alarming signal hidden from the public and medical community.
“We conclude that a major, albeit underreported, finding in the TADS was the significant increase of suicidal events in the adolescents on antidepressant medication in comparison to the group on placebo medication. The proportions of suicidal events were 11% and 2.7% respectively.”
This belated uncovering of the obfuscated suicide risks with fluoxetine (Prozac) in adolescents further undermines the ethical integrity and clinical implications drawn from the TADS study to justify pediatric prescription of antidepressants.
How can we justify prescribing antidepressants to vulnerable youth when the drugs carry a known risk of increasing suicidal ideation and behavior? This practice amounts to gambling with young lives based on questionable evidence of benefit.
Surely there must be overwhelming evidence that the drugs themselves offer substantial therapeutic benefits to justify such a potentially deadly risk, right?
Wrong.
It's Belief, Not the Drug
The mere belief that you're taking an antidepressant appears more powerful than the drugs themselves. In a stunning new paper, a re-analysis of the Treatment for Adolescents with Depression Study (TADS), researchers found that the participants' beliefs about whether they were receiving the active drug (fluoxetine) or placebo strongly predicted their treatment outcomes, regardless of the actual treatment they received.
The TADS re-analysis reveals a startling finding: the belief in receiving the active drug (fluoxetine) was more powerful than the drug itself in driving treatment outcomes.
If a teenager believed they were receiving Prozac but were actually given a placebo, they demonstrated an enhanced response. This suggests that the mere expectation of improvement, fueled by the belief in the drug's effectiveness, was sufficient to generate a significant therapeutic effect.
On the flip side, if a teen thought they had received the placebo when they had actually been given the antidepressant, their response was diminished.
The revelatory TADS re-analysis has unmasked a truth that rocks the very core of modern psychiatry: it's the belief in the drug, not the drug itself, that drives the apparent "benefits" of antidepressants in young people. This expectancy effect - the power of the mind to manifest improvement based on the mere anticipation of feeling better - has been shown to account for the vast majority of the supposedly pharmacological action of these “medications”.
"Our results are also consistent with other trials of antidepressants that show that participants' beliefs about the treatment they receive are strongly associated with outcomes, independently of the effect of treatment."
For adolescents under 25, antidepressants are so potentially hazardous they carry a black box warning for suicidal thoughts and worsening moods, as well as risks like mania, violence, and permanent sexual dysfunction.
The TADS bombshell confirms what many have long suspected: the power of belief trumps the power of the pill. The revelation that expectancy effects consistently rival or outperform the actual drugs shatters the illusion of antidepressant efficacy. It exposes the pharma-psychiatry alliance's dirty secret - that these meds are little more than expensive placebos with dangerous side effects.
We've been duped into handing our children's minds over to profiteering pill-pushers, when the real key to healing lies within. By harnessing the mind's natural ability to shape reality, we could unlock the true potential of the expectancy effect and revolutionize mental health care.
The Placebo Problem Plagues Adults Too
The TADS revelations are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the expectancy effect's influence on antidepressant outcomes. A closer look at the research on these drugs' efficacy in adults paints an equally disturbing picture.
Study after study has shown that the placebo response accounts for the lion's share of perceived improvement in adult depression trials. The chemical cocktails peddled by Big Pharma consistently fail to outperform dummy pills by any clinically meaningful margin.
“Antidepressants are supposed to work by fixing a chemical imbalance, specifically, a lack of serotonin in the brain. Indeed, their supposed effectiveness is the primary evidence for the chemical imbalance theory. But analyses of the published data and the unpublished data that were hidden by drug companies reveals that most (if not all) of the benefits are due to the placebo effect. Some antidepressants increase serotonin levels, some decrease it, and some have no effect at all on serotonin. Nevertheless, they all show the same therapeutic benefit. Even the small statistical difference between antidepressants and placebos may be an enhanced placebo effect, due to the fact that most patients and doctors in clinical trials successfully break blind. The serotonin theory is as close as any theory in the history of science to having been proved wrong. Instead of curing depression, popular antidepressants may induce a biological vulnerability making people more likely to become depressed in the future.”
- Irving Kirsch, PhD
Associate Director of the Program in Placebo Studies and Harvard Medical School
The antidepressant empire is built on a foundation of lies and deception. By concealing the truth about these drugs' reliance on the placebo effect, the medical establishment has robbed patients of their right to informed consent.
Millions have been misled into swallowing false promises of chemical cures, while the very real risks of adverse effects are swept under the rug. This is not just bad science - it's a profound violation of trust and autonomy.
Prescribing these medications without full transparency is an egregious ethical breach that strikes at the very heart of the doctor-patient relationship. Continuing to push these placebos masquerading as panaceas is not just scientifically bankrupt - it's morally reprehensible. The antidepressant industry's profits are built on a foundation of coercion and deceit. It's time for a reckoning.
RESIST
True story: in med school, I was taught that the suicide increase is proof that antidepressants work! Honest to goodness this was the reasoning: really depressed people are so depressed they can’t even get out of bed, but once they start taking antidepressants they start feeling good enough that they have enough energy/initiative to start planning their suicide. I promise I’m not making that up. To my infinite shame, I totally bought it, too, I remember just accepting that as we were taught it (I was in med school 2010-2014, so not that long ago). The question I now wish I had asked: “so, professor, if *some* people killing themselves is proof of how well antidepressants work, would a drug causing a 100% suicide rate be the most successful antidepressant ever?”
Great piece. Are you aware of the recent re-analysis of the STAR*D antidepressant data?
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/37491091/