A report just came out from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development stating that many of the world’s depressed or unhappy people live in developed countries where antidepressant use has skyrocketed.  This poses the question, why would people who live in developed countries be more depressed than those that live in places like Africa?  
It does not make sense that depression is more common in places like Canada, Australia or the United States.  How can depression be centralized this way?  What does make sense is that drug companies heavily target these areas to market and promote their drugs. 
As a result, one in ten adults in the United States and Canada are on antidepressants.  One drug company advertises that “depression hurts” followed by, “Cymbalta can help.”  Watching the ad, one would think that overnight, life would be a happy place again.  Antidepressants, such as Cymbalta, are drugs not to be taken casually as if they were aspirin.   They are strong powerful drugs that alter the brain chemistry.  They have serious adverse side effects and should not be considered comparable to aspirin.  
If so many people are on antidepressants one may ask are more people depressed?  Absolutely not.  Instead the definition of depression has become all encompassing.  Normal feelings of the blues and normal feelings of grief now fall under the category of depression.  Antidepressants are also prescribed for anxiety, insomnia, pain, high blood pressure and other off-label uses.  
It is the knitted relationship of the drug companies with psychiatry that has made this change.  Coupled with heavy marketing, more people are walking into their doctor’s office and complaining of unhappiness or just not being themselves.  As a result, the doctor prescribes an antidepressant as quickly as he would prescribe aspirin. 
Because of the strong influence of drug companies, antidepressants are being prescribed as a first option instead of exploring other solutions.  Natural alternatives are not offered as there’s no money for drug companies in the field of natural healing.   Drug companies don’t care if the real cause is the person’s diet or some other physical deficiency.  Instead, drug companies spend a lot of money on advertising and courting doctors to prescribe their drugs so they can make more profits. 
Drug companies do this in developed countries because it works.  Of course life in third world countries is much different than in developed countries.  Here in the United States, life has generally become fast paced and we are bombarded constantly with advertisements.  As a pill-popping society, people are eager for a quick fix, so an ad for a “happy pill” is enticing.  People don’t have time to be depressed and many doctors don’t have much time for their patients, so it is the perfect match for the drug companies. 
What’s wrong with this picture is the lack of information behind “mental disorders” and antidepressants.  Dr. Allen Frances, a lead psychiatrist who was in charge of the DSM-IV (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders), recently stated that one can’t define a “mental disorder.”  In fact, he said it’s BS.  This is because diagnosing someone with depression has no scientific basis.  
A “mental disorder” is just a label based on an opinion.  There is no blood test, urine test, MRI, or any other way to measure depression.  A doctor cannot do a biopsy of the brain and locate any depression.  It is a real feeling that has a source, but it is not a “mental illness” somewhere in the brain.  It is not comparable to diabetes, cancer or heart disease which can be measured and are actual biological diseases. 
However, drug companies spend a lot of money on “research,” professional conferences and journals.  Financial ties are common between psychiatrists, doctors and drug companies.  In return for their investment, “scientific” studies are done promoting and “discovering” mental illnesses as a biological fact so that the door is open to treat with antidepressants and other psychotropic drugs. 
This is how the chemical imbalance theory came about.  Supposedly those with depression have something wrong with their brain chemistry that affects mood.  Dr. David Healy, a leading psychiatrist in the United Kingdom, has been studying this theory for decades and has found no evidence of any such theory.  The chemical imbalance theory is just a front to make the patient think his depression is based on something scientific and to get him onto antidepressants. 
While third world countries are fighting real medical diseases, developed countries are being fooled by psychiatry and drug companies that in turn are enjoying soaring profits.  In a nutshell, the truth is antidepressants do more harm than help.  Since they do alter brain chemistry, Dr. Healy states that this could be why some people become suicidal and/or homicidal while on the drugs.  
The drug companies were well aware of this even in the very beginning, as it is shown in their clinical trials, but that information was initially hidden in order to get antidepressants on the market.  It wasn’t until many suicides had taken place and it was obvious that something needed to be done and then the FDA issued a Black Box Warning to alert patients of the increased risk of suicide.  Basically many people died because drugs sales became more important. 
Additionally, if you look at past shooting tragedies in Colorado, Newtown, Columbine, Virginia Tech and many others, the shooter was on antidepressants or other psychiatric medication, or was withdrawing from them.  Of course you don’t read anything about that in the newspaper because it’s probably the drug companies saying it’s the guns that are the problem.  
Needless to say, developed countries are fertile ground for shams like this.  Don’t be fooled by the marketing lies.  Forget the antidepressants and find the real cause of your depression.  Who needs to risk feeling suicidal and/or homicidal?  A very thorough medical exam by a non-psychiatric doctor would be a good start instead.
 
http://www.naturalnews.com/043026_antidepressants_Big_Pharma_developed_nations.html 
http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2012/12/02/pharmaceutical-companies-hide-information.aspx 
http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/stress-and-health-dr-lind/2013/may/9/terrible-psychiatric-joke/