Introduction
What does the World Health Organization project will be the leading cause of worldwide disability and loss of life by 2030? Could it be cancer? Or heart disease? Or perhaps even a war? Depression is the epidemic you might not even be aware is occurring at this very moment, all around you. In fact, 30 million adults in America suffer from it (Rottenburg 1). If 7 in 10 people report that they know someone who has depression, imagine how many millions of people are indirectly affected by depression as well as the millions directly impacted (1). The symptoms of depression are not always the most apparent, even to the person who has it, and may be dismissed as a bad mood, just common stress or not a big deal until a major episode occurs, endangering their life. Depression can go unnoticed for years and even once it is diagnosed, it is generally not curable. Even the treatment options we have in place are not as beneficial as we would hope. Antidepressant use has increased 400% since 1988, and there has been no improvement in psychotherapy for two generations (Rottenburg). This begs the question; will the depression epidemic ever end?
History
Literature and records of depression, originally called melancholia, can be found as far back as the very beginning of written history, in the Ancient Mesopotamian times between 4000 to 3500 B.C.(Nemade). Clearly, the depression epidemic in people has been around just about as long people have. With no real knowledge of mental illness, early civilizations struggled to explain what causes depression and how to cure it. Most early civilizations believed that all mental illnesses were the result of evil spirits and demonic possession that could only be treated by priests. Exorcism techniques such as restraining, beating and starving the afflicted to remove the demons were common (Nemade).
The beginnings of the depression epidemic and rise of epidemic are difficult to distinguish because the definitions of depression differed over the years between countries and doctors and lack of records, but there is evidence to prove that depression rates have been increasing at least recently. According to psychiatrist Eugene Rubin, in just the ten years between 1997 and 2007, 2.2 million more Americans were being treated for depression (Rubin).
Depression has been a problem for centuries and even with our improving technologies and medicine, this epidemic is continually getting increasingly worse around the world.
Social Effects
As the amount of American people diagnosed with depression increases, so does depression's economic effect. Every ten years the number of people treated for depression increases about 2.2 million (Rubin). This leads to an increasing demand for professionals certified to treat these patients and for medicine for their treatment. The number of physicians employed in America is projected to increase 15% in ten years and seeing as how a majority of those who seek therapy are seeking help with their depression, the correlation between the growth of both is obvious (What Is the Employment Outlook for a Psychiatrist Career?). Depression is creating jobs as well as impacting the flow of money in America. About 1 in 10 Americans use antidepressants, which are the third most common medicine prescribed to Americans. The rate of the use of antidepressants increased by 400% between 2005-2008 (Wehrein). Depression is also impacting Medicare significantly as in ten years, the amount Medicare paid increased at least one billion for antidepressants alone (Wehrein). Because the therapies for depression are so costly and so many people are suffering from it, depression is influencing the flow of billions of dollars in America.
Depression also has an impact in the work place. In fact, depression is considered the third top workplace issue following family crises and stress (Depression in the Work Place). Depression changes the way people think and act greatly. It can increase or decrease appetite and sleep habits, increase irritably, and lead to loss of energy and thoughts of suicide to name just a few of the effects (Depression in the Workplace). Productivity in the workplace is proven to be lessened when an employee is suffering from depression (Warner). Because of loss of productivity and effectiveness, the typical depressed employee cost the employer around 18 days of work when they are at work, not to mention the average of nine days taken off as sick days for
their mental health a year (Warner). Depression effects the employee, their coworkers, the employer and even the customer in any given workplace.
Examples
Depression can affect even the most unlikely of people and can be hidden in plain sight. A man who surprisingly struggled with periodic depression was the father of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud. He suffered from his periodic depression with symptoms including apathy and anxiety attacks (Khan). The competitivity in his field was said to lead to his depression, such as when another psychologist discovered that cocaine could be used as an anesthetic (Khan). He took small amounts of cocaine to ease the symptoms of his depression and said "“In my last severe depression, I took coca again and a small dose lifted me to the heights in wonderful fashion" (Khan). He recommended his treatment plan to others, only realizing cocaine's addictive property and dangerous effects much later. His failure in proving the beneficial properties of cocaine were discredit by physicians and lead to a huge embarrassment (Khan).
A more recent and well-known person that had depression was Ellen DeGeneres (Crofts). Yes, the hilarious, bubbly and kind talk show host and model went through it too. When she came out as a lesbian 20 years ago on the cover of Times magazine, she was attacked by the media and the people (Crofts). This led to the canceling of her show, her moving from Los Angles, going to a therapist and taking antidepressants for the first time in her life. She stated "It was scary and lonely(Crofts). All I'd known for 30 years was work, and all of a sudden, I had nothing. Plus, I was mad. It didn't feel fair — I was the same person everyone had always known." (Crofts). She remained in this dark state of mind for about three years and eventually built herself back up as the more successful and rich than ever host and voice for a major children's movie and has been happily married to her wife for years (Crofts).
Solutions
Finding an absolute solution to the depression epidemic is extremely complicated because depression is caused more by a combination of factors, rather than just one cause. Even these factors that are thought to cause depression are being debated. There is no " one size fits all" treatment plan that can cure it depression, but there are several treatments plans available.
An explanation offered for the cause of depression is biology. A common cause is thought to be chemical imbalance. The idea is that when there is a deficiency in neurotransmitters, the chemical messengers, the gaps between neurons interferes with nerve impulses, causing depression (Arkowitz). To treat this, prescription medicines like Zoloft help to regulate the chemical imbalance. Depression medication can improve mood, appetite and focus and can decrease anxiety, sleep disturbance and depressive symptoms (Hurley). However, people who take prescription depression medicine could experience the more negative side effects, as half of those who take it do (Depression: How Effective are Antidepressants?). These side effects include diarrhea or constipation, urination problems, nausea, dizziness, dry mouth, trembling, vision sleep problems (Depression: How Effective are Antidepressants?). Even more serious side effects are possible such as heart and liver problems (Depression: How Effective are Antidepressants?). In studies where placebo pills are given, 20-40 patients claim they have noticed improvement and 40-60 people who received the actual medication noticed improvement, so the medicine is only helping a fifth of the time (Depression: How Effective are Antidepressants?). Companies like Zoloft attribute their success to the ease of marketing created because chemical imbalance is such an easy way to provide an explanation for depression. In fact, according to a study done by psychologist Christopher France in 2007, about 85% of participants believe that chemical imbalances are "likely" the cause of depression (Arkowitz).
According to neuroscientist Joseph Coyle from Harvard Medical School, "Chemical imbalance is sort of last-century thinking. It's much more complicated than that" (Arkowitz). So, while medication may help alleviate some of the symptoms of depression, it's side effects are drastic and it may not be targeting the true root of the illness.
Another common treatment path is psychotherapy. According to Health Central, psychotherapy is not simply counseling, it can be used to describe "a variety of talk therapies that treat emotional, behavioral, personality, and psychiatric disorders" (Rabins). Therapy is an alternative to medication that has much less physical and mental risks. However, it does require a commitment to attend the sessions and typically takes twice as long as medication to be effective (Rabins). Therapy is often recommended when environmental factors are thought to be the trigger, although it can be beneficial to have therapy along with medications. According to Peter Rabins, "One study found that people with bipolar disorder who combined psychotherapy and medication had a 94% recovery rate in an average time of 113 days, compared with 52% of those who took [only] medication" (Rabins). But people who are in an acute manic state are not likely to benefit from psychotherapy or even be able to attend. Psychotherapy has the potential to greatly help some people, but it cannot be the sole solution to the depression epidemic.
Of all the different treatments available for those who suffer from depression that vary from medicine and therapy to natural remedies to exercising, none can significantly decrease the still growing rates of depression. The only solution is to find a new solution. Depression and the brain itself are still not fully understood, and it is near impossible to fix something if the way it works and what is wrong is not known. Only $415 million is allotted for depression research, research that seems to keep failing in clinical trials or coming up empty handed (Ledford). It seems like a large amount until compared to the $5.3 billion spent on cancer research, where
discoveries are constantly being made and knowledge is continually growing (Ledford). While depression is typically not as deadly as many cancers are, it's impacts on such are large percentage of people should not be over looked, especially as the rates are still growing. If proper efforts were put into resolving depression, a true solution or at least actual understanding of the illness could arise.
Camus and Absurdity
Albert Camus believed that the world we live in and life itself is absurd. He argues that a human life is just a dreadfully repetitive cycle of simple tasks that is essentially pointless as eventually every trace of mankind itself will be forgotten and eradicated. In his essay, "An Absurd Reasoning", Camus states that we should "accept that our desires do not match up with the world as we know it" (Hecht). He believes that the only way to go against the absurdity is to just understand and be conscious of them. He is entirely against belief systems, like religion, and suicide because they submit to the absurdity. Religion is a form of philosophical suicide, as it is merely accepting an explanation and reasoning provided without actual proof and is just a way to ignore the absurdity of life. He also says that suicide is letting absurdity win, as you're giving up on the life that was meant to pointless anyways and claiming, "killing oneself is an unwarranted insult to existence" (Hercht).
Camus' beliefs regarding suicide and acceptance make assuming his opinions about depression complicated. He could think depression is a way of letting life's absurdity win by being unhappy and miserable. Suicide is, after all, a result of depression becoming overwhelming and unbearable. In "An Absurd Reasoning", Camus said "yet love the unanswerable strangeness of it all" while depression is the opposite reaction to the world. However, Camus did recognize how difficult life was to enjoy and love as it was filled with sorrow, anguish, anxiety and
exhausting and repetitive, every day for everyone (Hecht). He probably would not have been surprised at how the depression epidemic is still such a relevant problem as it truly is just another aspect of our absurd lives.
Conclusion
Although knowledge of depression has come a long way from its melancholia days, there is still so much to be learned. There is no solid solution and depression rates continue to rise even higher. More than 350 million people are affected by depression, yet it lacks the funding to improve the situation. The depression epidemic shows no signs of resolving and will continue to spread until a true effort is made to solve it.
Works Cited
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Crofts, Cassie. “Ellen DeGeneres Talks about Her Battle with Depression.” Smooth, www.smooth.com.au/entertainment/clone-ellen-degeneres-opens-about-being-bullied.
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