Antidepressant use has more than doubled with concern over the increased use of the medication in the young and elderly

THE number of Australians using antidepressants has more than doubled this century with experts expressing concern that we may be overmedicating mental problems.

THE number of Australians using antidepressants has more than doubled this century and only Iceland now has a higher rate of use of the drugs.

Experts are warning we may soon need to take action to check doctors prescribing the pills in the same way we are re-educating the population about antibiotic use.

It points to the desperate need for $1 billion of new spending on community mental health services called for by the National Mental Health Commission in 2015, Mental Health Australia says.

More than 2.7 million Australians are taking antidepressants and together with anti-anxiety medications they make up 10 of the top 50 most-prescribed medications on our medicines subsidy scheme.

Ten years ago there were only seven antidepressants and anti-anxiety medicines in the top 50 most prescribed medicines, government Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme data shows.

Figures from the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) show in 2000 45 Australians in every 1,000 adults were prescribed antidepressants — by 2013 that had risen to 96 people in every 1,000.

Prozac one of the top 50 drugs used in Australia. Picture: Alamy

Beyond Blue spokesman Dr Stephen Carbone says the growth in antidepressant use is not necessarily a bad thing.

“You could argue we are ahead of the game in raising public awareness and the destigmatisation of the conditions,” he said.

Mental health conditions are the third biggest group of conditions suffered by Australians, they are serious conditions and it is not surprising medications for them make it into the top 10 prescription count, he said.

But there is growing concern about the overuse of antidepressants particularly in some groups such as the young and the elderly.

“It’s like what happened with antibiotic prescriptions there was cause for concern about overprescribing. I think some of the things we are doing with antibiotics we will soon need to start going with antidepressants,” Dr Carbone said.

Best-practice care would see people with mild to moderate depression and anxiety first receive psychological help and cognitive behavioural therapy before medication is prescribed, he said.

Frank Quinlan, CEO of Mental Health Australia wants more psychological and support services rather than medicines. Picture: Supplied

Mental Health Australia chief Frank Quinlan said a recent UN report expressed concern we were over medicalising mental problems when the first interventions should be supports for relationships, families, financial stability and employment stability.

In 2015 the government’s National Mental Health Commission had called for the urgent expansion of community mental health services to the tune of $1 billion, yet we had not seen investment that would take us anywhere near that, Mr Quinlan said.

Australian Bureau of Statistics data in 2011 showed antidepressant use was highest among the over-75s.

More than a third of this age group were taking the medications even though older people are less likely to suffer from depression than younger Australians.

There is a concern aged care facilities may be medicating patients to keep them under control and there is evidence people who moved into aged care were more likely to suffer depression, Dr Carbone said.

“Something is happening in the over 75 group and on the data there is a mismatch between the rate of depression and the scripts. We need to dig deeper and have a look at what is going on,’ he said.

Concern about overuse antidepressants in the young. Picture: iStock

News Corp Australia has also reported children as young as two are being prescribed antidepressants linked to deaths despite warnings from the world’s medicine regulators.

A News Corp Australia investigation found there are 1022 children aged two to six years using the medications, an increase of 16 per cent since 2008-09.

And data from the Department of Human Services shows a further 26,000 children under the age of 16 were using antidepressants in 2012-13.

Dr Carbone said doctors prescribing medications to this age group needed to think carefully about what they were doing.

Four per cent of young people prescribed antidepressants experienced an increase in suicidal thinking and behaviour, he said.

There were some rare, severe cases where these type of medications would need to be used in very young people, he said.

“But I would have to say the number of kids on them should be modest but you can’t absolutely say never prescribe them,” he said.

Also of concern is the high rate of prescribing of medications such as diazepam — an anti-anxiety and sedative drug — because people can develop a tolerance to it and become dependant on it.

There were more than 2.4 million scripts written for this medication in 2015-16.