Fact is "depression" is among the most prevalent illness among humans, and a leading cause of disability world-wide. It affects people in all regions though incidence is higher in industrialized countries for unknown reasons.
Part of the problem in talking about the condition is that the word "depression" may refer to a variety of feelings or behavioral states--in everyday usage it's not a precise term at all.
But in the context of the article, I infer the issue is "clinical depression", a very serious illness that has specific diagnostic meaning.
Distinguishing depression-as-illness from a passing mood, or transient discouragement is important. It's normal to have these moods at times of loss, high stress, etc., but not normal when it becomes persistent and affects thinking, energy, motivation, interests, or physiological rhythms.
As the article points out, suicidal thinking and action can be associated with depression. The mortality rate of severe depression is high, on the order of 15%, a decidedly non-trivial matter.
One more statistic to point out is the cost burden of depression. A very recent study estimated depression costs the US nearly $200 billion per year, more than cancer ($131 billion) or diabetes ($171 billion) annually. Considering that a minority of patients with depression receive adequate treatment, we can surmise much of the high cost of depression could be reduced by earlier intervention.
Depression is a treatable disease, the majority of sufferers respond at least moderately well to medication and non-medication therapies. Treatment doesn't always work as well as we'd like, but the problem is not being neglected. Since there's so much at stake, it's an extremely active field of research; our treatment tools will get better.
The important message is depression is a real illness that can be and should be vigorously treated. Ignoring reality does not make it go away. No one is immune, not entrepreneurs, programmers, engineers, doctors, janitors, or the fabulously wealthy.
Let's not continue to let a treatable illness turn into tragedy.
Treating depression like an illness makes it into a medical problem, and medical treatment is simply not the best recourse for a large number of people with even 'clinical depression'. The huge variety of causes and its transience makes it much less like other medical diseases, and so trying to treat it like a medical disease often won't work.
While I agree that medication is for many people an appropriate way to treat some forms of depression, it's certainly not a panacea. You don't treat diabetes by just taking medicine; you also don't eat crap that fucks with your blood sugar. If you have scoliosis, you don't just wear a back brace during childhood; you also avoid trying out for the football team. If your family has a history of melanomas, you stay out of the sun and put on sun lotion.
It's important to note that some of these treatments are not strictly 'medical treatments' - they're ways of living your life that reduce the impact of the disease. Just talking about disease is incredibly morbid. So to my mind, thinking of yourself as having a disease is actually the opposite of what you want to treat depression. Sure, it's comforting to have a way to define oneself in order to understand what's going wrong. But a negative focus on yourself is really the wrong way to go about reducing the impact of depression.
Yes, studies and medications and non-medication therapies and prescribed treatments are all useful in 'combating the disease', until you realize that it isn't one single disease. It's a human condition that varies in cause from chemical imbalances to unexpected life changes, and is incredibly difficult to diagnose the root cause of, not to mention find a workable treatment for. Relating the emotional state of humans to the working of their organs is a bit like relating an Indy 500 race's lap stats to the engines in the cars on the track.
So until we establish an actual field of science that focuses on every conceivable treatment of every form of depression, could we all please stop being so clinical about the whole thing?
Part of the problem in talking about the condition is that the word "depression" may refer to a variety of feelings or behavioral states--in everyday usage it's not a precise term at all.
But in the context of the article, I infer the issue is "clinical depression", a very serious illness that has specific diagnostic meaning.
Distinguishing depression-as-illness from a passing mood, or transient discouragement is important. It's normal to have these moods at times of loss, high stress, etc., but not normal when it becomes persistent and affects thinking, energy, motivation, interests, or physiological rhythms.
As the article points out, suicidal thinking and action can be associated with depression. The mortality rate of severe depression is high, on the order of 15%, a decidedly non-trivial matter.
One more statistic to point out is the cost burden of depression. A very recent study estimated depression costs the US nearly $200 billion per year, more than cancer ($131 billion) or diabetes ($171 billion) annually. Considering that a minority of patients with depression receive adequate treatment, we can surmise much of the high cost of depression could be reduced by earlier intervention.
Depression is a treatable disease, the majority of sufferers respond at least moderately well to medication and non-medication therapies. Treatment doesn't always work as well as we'd like, but the problem is not being neglected. Since there's so much at stake, it's an extremely active field of research; our treatment tools will get better.
The important message is depression is a real illness that can be and should be vigorously treated. Ignoring reality does not make it go away. No one is immune, not entrepreneurs, programmers, engineers, doctors, janitors, or the fabulously wealthy.
Let's not continue to let a treatable illness turn into tragedy.