Teen Suicide up 18% Says Latest Research

According to a new study that came out earlier this month from the Pediatrics Journal of Medicine there has been a serious increase in suicides among teenagers in the last few years. Speculation is that the increase in suicides is connected to the recent media and FDA reports stating that certain antidepressant drugs can cause some teenagers to feel suicidal. However since those drugs are no longer being offered to teenagers suffering with depression, the suicide rate has increased by 18%. And that is totally unacceptable.

It is true that Prozac may have ill effects on some children, but there are so many new antidepressant drugs available now that it is bad medicine to throw the baby out with the bath water and refuse to offer any type of medicinal help for these suffering teens. Those who are now a part of that 18% statistic may have found help in other, safer drugs. If their family, friends, and doctors had been willing to start them on a drug that was safe for them, those children might still be alive today.

Today my soap box includes frustration at huge conglomerates like the FDA making life and death decisions based on insufficient studies and then globalizing their findings to include all available medications. They make policies and laws to prevent the public from getting the right help, the best help, for them.

I'm a parent first, and if my child needed a drug that might save his life, I would do whatever was in my power to get the right doctor and the best treatment avbailable. The FDA for all the good they do, have in my opinion really messed one up here.

Full article about the research is here.