TITLE

Depression: Why We Need an Operation Warp Speed for Treatments

DESCRIPTION

This year, though the pandemic, has witnessed a significant increase in anxiety, depression, and a wide variety of mental health disorders.   The author of this article begins by relating a personal history of her sister’s life long depression and its recurrence without remitting.  “Until recently, major depression has felt like a ghost disease–invisible but devastating. It’s a disorder that still affects millions every year–one in four of us will suffer a depressive episode in their lifetime. Despite those numbers and the fact that humans have been documenting and speculating about it for millennia, we’re only beginning to understand its biology.  How differently would we think about depression if we could visualize it, track it and fight it the way we do cancer or the novel coronavirus?”  The article discusses some new research that looks at particular neuronal cells (astrocytes) and a new blood test that can detect changes and pick out the biological markers of major depression in the brain.   The hope is that medications and therapy could eventually be tailored to each individual’s needs.  The author states that if we treated major depression as we have the corona virus, “This effort could include an ‘operation warp speed‘ type-accelerator for all this promising biomarker research, plus an infusion of resources to provide universal access to therapists and existing treatments right now. Given that all of us know someone or are someone who’s battled this disease, it’s everyone’s issue.”

This article can be used in conjunction with chapters on the neurological basis of Psychology as well as the chapters on abnormal and psychopathology.

SOURCE

TIME, May 17, 2021, by Susanna Schrobsdorff

LINK TO RESOURCE

https://time.com/6048942/why-we-need-a-mental-health-moonshot-for-depression-in-the-wake-of-the-pandemic/ 

(Tiny URL)  https://tinyurl.com/n6ccfcw

CLASS DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

•What are the different types of depression? (Use your textbook in conjunction with the article.)

•Historically, what does the author discuss about the difficulties finding a “cure” for major depression?  (You can use the textbook chapter on therapy along with the article.)

•The article focuses new findings from biological research.  What are the findings from RNA biomarker studies, blood testing, and the discovery of astrocytes?

*The author expresses a great deal of hopefulness at the end of the article.  What is the author’s hope?