More doubts about Prozac

[unixronin]

Recently, Prozac and related SSRI antidepressants were dealt a blow when it was made public that Eli Lilly, Glaxo-SmithKline and the other manufacturers of the drugs had failed to disclose data from unfavorable clinical studies that showed patients using SSRIs had an increase as much as four to one in suicide risk.  Now, a new study from Hull University, using the data submitted to the FDA to gain approval for the drugs, has found that for most patients, SSRIs are no more effective than a placebo.

Eli Lilly, of course, defends the drugs' effectiveness; and another researcher, the head of psychopharmacology at Bristol University, says that "if they provide some sort of placebo benefit, this shouldn't be discounted."

Now, the thing that immediately occurs to me is this: If you have the choice between a placebo that is medically inert, and has no side effects that aren't psychosomatic, or a drug that performs no better than the placebo, but has a vicious side-effect profile and may quadruple your likelihood of suicide ... aren't you better off with the placebo?

Clarification:

I should point out that I have not read the studies cited; I have only read summaries.  My intention here was not to discuss the studies per se, but rather to question the idea that it's still a good idea to use a drug with known severe side-effects for it's placebo-like effect if it's (allegedly) no better than a placebo.

Comments

[unix-jedi.livejournal.com]

This anecdata adds nothing to the debate.

If we toss anecdotes - (which is fine by me; I use them to point out systematic flaws, not ones with the drugs per se) - then ... we have to toss yours and house_pundit's as well. That was really my complaint - success stories are anecdotal.

That's the problem with this issue - too many people want to toss the anecdotes from the other side, while celebrating the ones from the side they support. That's many things, but scientific isn't one of them.