The question is: Is our society getting more depressed year by year? I read some alarming figures in the newspaper the other day that prescriptions for anti-depressants have almost doubled in the last decade.
The Business Services Authority of the National Health Service (NHS) in Britain released figures this month issued 39.1 million prescriptions for a population of 60 million people. Compared to 20.1 million in 1999. That’s a 95% increase in 10 years.
In an economic downturn with threats to jobs and income, 7% of people interviewed said they had to turn to anti-depressants because of their worries for themselves and their families.
The government and the drug companies claim three reasons for this increase – improved diagnosis, reduced stigma about depression and lack of access to “talking therapies.”
It’s very convenient for the government and drug barons to come up with such explanations. I suspect these are not major factors at all but three of the conditions among many.
We live in a mad environment – riddled with desire and fear, endless anxiety about money, debts, employment, health and the future. Doctors give out drugs like parents giver their small children smarties – those pill like coloured sweets in a tube.
We deceived ourselves into believing we live in the age of enlightenment, opted for science and knowledge as our new God. We have no understanding what contributes to happiness, clarity and profound realisations and what makes us turn to anti-depressants at £6.00 a hit.
Physicians attend to the state of the body. That’s their job. They have little knowledge of the mind, its conditionality, stories and beliefs. I don’t ask a gardener to take care of the electricity. How can a doctor possibly know in the space of a few minutes whether a patient feeling low or clinically depressed. Another prescription for man, woman or child means he or she will join the millions of others dependent on drugs.
Why. We are not a free society but an addicted one.
Alcohol, drugs, junk food, tobacco, relentless advertising, blind pursuit of pleasure, aggression, television, that’s mostly an insult to intelligence, and much else besides contribute to this society atomised into beliefs in self existence and dishing out prescriptions when the problem lies much deeper.
We are all in this mess together. There is no sign of any real awareness of the complexity and diversity of the daily suffering in our way of life. There is too little difference between the prescribers, the prescription and those who receive the prescription.
We need a public dialogue into a rather sick and broken society, an ending of the obsession with economic growth, and a vast network of people who understand the relationship of the inner life to values and lifestyle.
We need many more people skilled in offering methods , techniques and practices in mindfulness and daily life with reminders of the transcendent that’s close at hand. Inner and outer exploration must go together as they are mutually dependent.