Internet Addiction Disorder has yet to be officially recognized, but specific symptoms have been outlined, and it’s a subject matter that continues to undergo evaluation. One doctor says Internet addiction could easily become one of the most chronic childhood diseases in America.
The National Perinatal Depression Plan announced in the recent budget proposes to introduce routine screening during pregnancy and after birth. But the researchers say there is little evidence to support such interventions, with screening tools producing high rates of false positives and negatives for depression.
In June 2005, the Seattle Times published a series of reports including one titled, “Suddenly Sick,” by Susan Kelleher and Duff Wilson, with the byline: “The hidden big business behind your doctor’s diagnosis,” and discussed the successful trick of using “risk factors” in past drug marketing campaigns.
“You are suddenly sick,” the authors wrote, “simply because the definitions of disease have changed.” And behind those changes, the Times found, were “the companies that make all those newly prescribed pills.”
The New York Times’ Benedict Carey reported this week that the Army “plans to require that all 1.1 million of its soldiers take intensive training in emotional resiliency.”
“Resiliency” is not something learned in a “crash course.” It’s a backdrop for what we used to call “character,” something parents and religious organizations instilled over years. You can have all the “resiliency” classes and role-playing and “conflict resolution” strategies you like, but if it is not in keeping with the underlying personality of the individual, it won’t work in the end.
It’s easy to make jokes about “preschool depression”—students get it every time the alarm rings—but finding depression, “relapses,” “chronicity,” and “treatment resistance” in 3-year-olds is not funny.
Researchers used to believe that “young children were too cognitively and emotionally immature to experience depressive effects,” says Joan L. Luby, M.D., but now believe they can and do suffer from Major Depressive Disorder (MDD).