LAST year, one of our most commonly held ideas about depression was turned upside down. "Antidepressants study casts doubt on drugs taken by 8m people," The Times newspaper stated in July. Other publications ran similarly alarming headlines. Depression is one of the biggest medical problems facing societies worldwide, treatments have long been controversial and here was research showing that Prozac and other common antidepressants are based on a defunct hypothesis about what causes the condition. The study's lead researcher even went as far as to suggest that any benefits from such medicines come from a placebo effect.
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