every prescription conveys a message of hopelessness and powerlessness.

• +..industrial techno


• +..melodic synth


• +..EBM

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Evidence suggests that for people without mental health problems, antidepressant drugs are unpleasant to take and make them feel worse. The evidence reviewed in the previous chapter suggests that we have no reason to believe that they elevate mood in patients either. A drug-centred view of the treatment of depression must start by listing the possible effects that drugs are known to induce. We know that many drugs can induce euphoria in the short term, including alcohol, opiates, stimulants, benzodiazepines and others. However this effect is strongly dependent on context. In other words, someone has to be in the right environment and in the right state of mind for the euphoria to occur. In the wrong environment or state of mind, the same effects can be experienced as unpleasant. In addition, the body develops tolerance to the effect so that higher and higher doses are required to produce it. This is the basis of addiction to drugs such as opiates and alcohol. People have to increase the dose to achieve the effect they desire and cannot stop or reduce the drug because the body’s adaptations to it give rise to an unpleasant and sometimes dangerous withdrawal syndrome when the drug is removed. Other drug-induced effects that might be relevant to someone with depression, include sedation of various types, emotional indifference and physiological stimulation. However it is difficult to believe that any of these effects could be particularly useful in depression, especially in the long term. It would also seem ethically dubious to recommend that someone who is depressed should take a drug in order to blunt or numb their emotional responses, even though a drug with these properties might look extremely effective when judged by depression-rating scales.
Moncrieff, J