# \[e-drug\] Increased Antidepressant Use Link to Fall in Suicide Rates **URL:** \ **Category:** e-drug\ **Created:** [October 17, 2003, 8:07am UTC](https://talk.edrugplus.org/t/e-drug-increased-antidepressant-use-link-to-fall-in-suicide-rates/17924 "2003-10-17T08:07:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 1\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![valeria.frighi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/b5ac83/32.png) [@valeria.frighi](https://talk.edrugplus.org/u/valeria.frighi)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2003, 8:07am UTC](https://talk.edrugplus.org/t/e-drug-increased-antidepressant-use-link-to-fall-in-suicide-rates/17924/1 "2003-10-17T08:07:29Z")
E-drug: Increased Antidepressant Use Link to Fall in Suicide Rates --------------------------------------------------------------------- [Copied as fair use. HH] Increased Antidepressant Use Link to Fall in Suicide Rates Conference Coverage 16th European College of Neuropsychopharmacology Congress By Richard Woodman, Reuters Health LONDON Sept 24 - Suicide rates have fallen dramatically in many countries following wider use of modern antidepressant drugs, psychiatrists heard on Wednesday. This finding contrasts with charges from some patients and advocacy groups that SSRIs (selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors) are addictive and can trigger violence and suicide. A jury awarded $6.4 million in 2001 against GlaxoSmithKline after deciding Paxil was partly to blame for the behaviour of Donald Schell who, after taking the drug, shot dead his wife, daughter and granddaughter and then himself. Earlier this year UK regulators said that the Glaxo drug and Wyeth's Efexor (Effexor in the US) should not be taken by under-18s because of an increased risk of suicidal thoughts in this age group. A recent change in the drug label also says the risk of suicide can be higher in the early days of therapy. But Goran Isacsson, professor in the department of psychiatry at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, said studies in several countries showed suicide rates had declined, sometimes dramatically, since the SSRI drugs were introduced. He told the European Neuropsychopharmacology Congress in Prague that analysis of suicides in Sweden suggested about 100 deaths were prevented in 1990 following the drugs' Swedish launch. As the use increased, so the suicide rate continued to decline. Another study, of 15,400 Swedish suicides between 1992 and 2000, showed that the suicide rate in people taking antidepressants was 217 per 100,000 person years compared with 477 in people not taking antidepressants. Evidence from other Nordic countries, Australia, and a dramatic decline in suicides among young people in the United States also backed the association between rising drug use and declining suicide, though he stressed this did not prove antidepressants prevent suicide. David Baldwin, senior lecturer at Southampton University, UK, said suicide rates had declined in the UK from 6.3 per 1000 person years in the era before treatment to 5.7 in the ECT era, to 3.3 following the introduction of the first antidepressants in the 1960s. "We can't say this is due to the arrival of antidepressants or ECT -- there are many other factors to consider -- but certainly there has been no increase in suicide as antidepressant treatments have become available," he said. -- To send a message to E-Drug, write to: e-drug@healthnet.org To subscribe or unsubscribe, write to: majordomo@healthnet.org in the body of the message type: subscribe e-drug OR unsubscribe e-drug To contact a person, send a message to: e-drug-help@healthnet.org Information and archives: [http://www.essentialdrugs.org/edrug](http://www.essentialdrugs.org/edrug)