Antidepressants are making a killing. The promotion of depression as an illness treatable with drugs has become a scandalous enterprise with little or no merit.

The psychiatric drug I have chosen to call to the stand is “Cymbalta,” which has been advertised numerous times with the promise to relieve its users from their symptoms of depression, but the side effects are worse than what the medicine promises to cure. The commercial for Cymbalta asks viewers brief questions on depression, and then leads in with a simple fact about how depression affects people. After that they just claim Cymbalta can help, followed by an endless list of side effects and medical issues no one has ever heard of.

The most common side effect is Dystonia, sustained muscle contractions that cause twisting and repetitive movements or abnormal postures.

Another is Tardive Dyskinesia, a difficult to treat and often incurable from the dyskinesia that results in uncontrollable movements of the face, and tongue. Cymbalta also makes promises that patients taking the drug may experience a decrease in white blood cells, lowering the body’s ability fight infection. The possibility of developing any of these syndromes wouldn’t make me happier.

According to Andrew W. Saul, a Therapeutic Nutrition Specialist and author of the book Doctor Yourself: Natural Healing That Works, “In 1992, the FDA’s drug evaluation process took two years before it was released to the public, but after 1994, it was changed to six months”. Doctors only know 50 percent of what a drug can do before it starts being sold to millions.

In February 2004, college student Traci Johnson, 19, was involved in test group for Cymbalta, codenamed duloxetine at the time. After only four days on the drug, she hanged herself with a scarf from a shower rod in an Indianapolis laboratory run by Drug Company Eli Lilly. The FDA was brought in to investigate whether the drug had anything to do with her death, but the results were inconclusive.

Some clinical trial data are considered commercially protected information, and thus exempted from public release under the Freedom of Information Act. Since the FDA doesn’t routinely perform follow-ups of drugs once they are on the market, when uncommon but deadly side effects tend to appear, independent researchers are often the only hope of catching such flaws. The FDA approved Cymbalta to treat depression in August 2004.

Today anyone may be taking psychiatric drugs unknowingly, just renamed and repackaged. “Zyban”, a pill to help people quit smoking is actually “Wellbutrin”, an anxiety drug. “Yentrever” a medicine for urinary difficulties, is being marketed as Cymbalta behind the scenes.

The American public is being treated like a mass test subject and the doctors who issue these medicines should be tried for crimes against humanity.

I wish I could confront the people who ignore all these problems and take the drugs. Why take the risk? Were you really so unhappy to put your own well-being on the line? It’s all theory about what these drugs really do and it’s sad that now every emotional problem has been narrowed down to a label.

If you’re a person who experiences depression, consider doing something you might find exciting or getting back in touch with something that used to bring you great joy rather than popping a pill and hoping all your problems will go away.

Prevention is always the best cure.