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TIME - Man of the Year
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1993-04-08
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THE WEEK, Page 25HEALTH & SCIENCEIt's a Sad, Sad World
Depression is on the rise, and the young are the most vulnerable
If the world has been getting you down lately, you're not
alone. According to a major international study published in the
Journal of the American Medical Association, the younger you
are, the greater the chance that you have suffered from
clinical depression sometime in your life. The investigation
combined 12 local and regional studies made during the 1980s in
such places as the U.S., Taiwan, Munich, Paris, Beirut and
Christchurch, New Zealand. In virtually every case, people born
before 1905 had a lower rate of depression than those born
between 1905 and 1914, who in turn had a lower rate than those
born between 1915 and 1924, and so on.
The depression rates vary widely from place to place, and
there are age groups in which the trend jumps upward or even
temporarily downward. In Beirut, for example, periods of
especially severe political unrest were paralleled by a sharp
rise in depression. Overall, though, the trend is steadily
upward in every age group. The cause? Researchers suggest it
might have to do with the breakdown of families, or increased
drug use, or the fact that more people are living in cities.
The truth is they simply don't know, which is depressing in
itself.