From the Los Angeles Times: “In the two years after a fatal school shooting, the rate at which antidepressants were prescribed to children and teens rose by 21% within a tight ring around the affected school.
The increase in antidepressants prescribed to kids grew more â nearly 25% â three years after a school shooting, suggesting that survivorsâ depression lingers long after the incident has begun to fade from a communityâs memory …
‘School shootings represent a tiny fraction of gun deaths in America,’ said Stanford University health economist Maya Rossin-Slater, the paperâs lead author. ‘But they are uniquely potentially traumatizing, and may have these much larger indirect costs â depression, delayed grief, kids not able to move on and be successful in their lives’ …
The uptick in antidepressant prescribing was least evident when a school shooting occurred in an area with many social workers and psychologists but few child psychiatrists â the principal prescribers of antidepressants …
Another key finding: School shootings appear more likely to upend the mental health of a communityâs children than to disturb the emotional well-being of adults. While antidepressant prescriptions to young people rose near schools where a fatal shooting took place, there was no corresponding hike in antidepressant prescribing to adults.”