Comment by Murfalo

Comment by Murfalo 3 days ago

The truth about antidepressants is that the majority of people with depression that respond to an antidepressant would also have responded to a placebo. This doesn't mean that their depression isn't real or that antidepressants "don't work". It just means that placebo has a relatively high response rate in trials for depression. The hate is (among other points) because they are only arguably, marginally, better than placebo, and antidepressants also have real side effects (activation syndrome, increased suicidality, sexual side effects, withdrawals, etc.) over placebo.

andruby 3 days ago

> The truth about antidepressants is that the majority of people with depression that respond to an antidepressant would also have responded to a placebo.

^ citation needed

What does "would have responded" mean? Are you saying that >50% of people with depression that are "helped" by antidepressant, would have been helped _to a similar extend_ with a placebo?

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arghwhat 3 days ago

I believe that is indeed what they meant. The perception of being given a remedy is very powerful indeed, especially for issues ultimately linked to the mind.
That placebos can work should not be seen as undermining the severity or pain of the depression, but rather underline the power of tricking the mind into improvement.

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Murfalo 3 days ago

Two papers that might be of interest to people regarding this topic would be Kirsch 2014 and Cipriani 2018.
And yes, agreed with argwhat.

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IAmBroom 3 days ago

> The hate is (among other points) because they are only arguably, marginally, better than placebo

Only true for some. Inarguably, well-proven false for others.

Likewise, placebos and aspirin are comparable at relieving those headaches where aspirin doesn't really solve the source, but that doesn't mean aspirin's well-documented effects are meaningless in general.

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