Big pharma-funded psychiatrists ‘cosplaying science’ in misleading antidepressant withdrawal study

Psychiatrists have been accused of downplaying the risks of antidepressant withdrawal in a new study.

The paper claims, with confidence, that withdrawal symptoms from antidepressants are minimal and easily managed, contradicting previous evidence. It also suggests that patients should be reassured when discontinuing medication. 

The study was led by researchers at Imperial College London and King’s College London. They identified the types and frequencies of the symptoms people experience when stopping antidepressants. They found that “most people do not experience severe withdrawal”. The paper claims that symptoms are usually “mild” and “short-lived” 

However, psychiatrists, psychologists and patients have widely criticised the study due to its reliance on short-term clinical trials lasting only 8-12 weeks. The reality is that people most often use antidepressants for years. Alongside this, it ignores the lived experience of thousands of people. 

A growing problem with antidepressant withdrawal

In the UK alone, there are around nine million people on antidepressants. Long-term use of antidepressants has been linked to weight gain, sexual dysfunction, bleeding, emotional numbness, suicidal thoughts and feelings, falls, and poorer long-term outcomes. Since the 90s, patients have reported unpleasant withdrawal symptoms when stopping the medications.  

A 2024 Lancet review discovered that one in six people will experience discontinuation symptoms when stopping antidepressants. 

Another study found that for 40% of people, withdrawal symptoms lasted over two years, with 80% of these people moderately or severely impacted by them. In total, one in four were unable to stop the medications and returned to them. 

Studies also suggest that the longer someone takes an antidepressant, the more likely they are to experience prolonged and severe withdrawal symptoms. 

This raises big questions about the number of people who try, fail and ultimately continue taking the medication for the rest of their lives. 

Dr Mark Horowitz is a training psychiatrist who has a PhD in the neurobiology of depression and the pharmacology of antidepressants. He told the Canary: 

This study has the capacity to cause a lot of damage to patients.

If it influences the psychiatry guidelines, then psychiatrists will fail to spot withdrawal because they’ll be educated that it’s not something to look out for, they’ll think that everybody is relapsing, that they’re experiencing a return of their anxiety or depression, they won’t manage people carefully by taking them off the drugs, so they’ll cause a lot of harm. 

When asked about the people already struggling with antidepressant withdrawal, Horowitz said: 

People can have months or years of sometimes disabling neurological, psychological, physical symptoms, panic attacks, electric shock sensations, and dizziness. It can mean they can’t work, their relationships fall apart, really, what it looks like is an injury to the nervous system caused by being on and coming off the drugs. 

These people already have great difficulties getting recognition, doctors dismiss them as it’s just mental illness, or you’ve developed some kind of new physical condition, maybe it’s in your head, they call it functional neurological disorder or medically unexplained symptoms, a sort of dismissive, psychosomatic term. So, if people are already struggling, they end up having to rely on friends and family to support them.

And the truth is, people take their own lives because they are so disabled by their symptoms and on top of it, they can’t get financial support.

We’ve seen this film before

Dr Horowitz pointed out the similarities to the fossil fuel industry’s denial of the climate crisis and cigarettes. Naomi Oreskes highlighted these in her book, Merchants of Doubt. 

Oreskes pointed out that when people are defending a commercial status quo, such as cigarette sales, fossil fuels, or in this case, antidepressant withdrawal, they start by denying the issue exists. 

Then, when more data accumulates and it becomes harder to deny, they slow it down by introducing doubt. We saw this with smoking, when cigarette companies funded misleading research papers on the links between asbestos and cancer, stress and cancer. The idea is to complicate the issue to slow down action. 

Horowitz said that this is exactly what this paper is attempting to do:

This paper is a move by industry-friendly academics to slow down, misdirect, confuse, and sow doubt, to stop this from getting out of control.

There is no money in antidepressants anymore; all these drugs are off patent. What there is, is a bunch of academics in the UK who have made their careers and millions of pounds off telling the public that drugs are safe, effective, and easy to stop, and now they look like they were misleading the public, as it comes out, but that’s not true, and so they’re trying very hard to cover, to save face here, to cover what makes them look a little bit culpable.

Conflicts of interest

Of the 19 authors of the antidepressant withdrawal study, 11 have received funding or benefits from pharmaceutical companies in the form of advisory board, consultancy or speaker fees or research funding.

• Michail Kalfas – Neurocentrx Pharma.
• Sameer Juahar – Boehringer Ingelheim, Janssen, Lundbeck, and Recordati.
• Robert McCutcheon –  Boehringer Ingelheim, Janssen, Karuna, Lundbeck, Newron, Otsuka, and Viatris
• Toby Pillinger – Lundbeck, Otsuka, Sunovion, Janssen, Schwabe Pharma, ROVI Biotech,
  and Recordati.
• Oliver Howes – Angellini, Autifony, Biogen, Boehringer Ingelheim, Eli Lilly, Heptares, Global Medical Education, Invicro, Janssen, Lundbeck, Neurocrine, Otsuka, Sunovion, Rand, Recordati, Roche, Viatris (formerly Mylan), and ROVI Biotech
• Allen Young – AstraZeneca, Boehringer Ingelheim, Eli Lilly, LivaNova, Lundbeck, Sunovion, Servier, Livanova, Janssen, Allegan, Bionomics, Sumitomo Dainippon Pharma, COMPASS Pathways, Sage, Novartis, and Neurocentrx
• Rebecca Strawbridge – Lundbeck
• Peter Haddad – Janssen and “other pharmaceutical companies manufacturing antipsychotic drugs.”
• Philip Cowen – Eli Lilly, Servier, Lundbeck, and GlaxoSmithKline.
• David Baldwin – AstraZeneca, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Eli Lilly Ltd, Glaxo-SmithKline, Janssen, H. Lundbeck A/S, Pharmacia, Pierre Fabre, Pfizer Ltd, Servier, and Wyeth Ltd.
• Carmine Pariante – Lilly, Servier, and Janssen.

It makes you think, whilst there may not be money in unpatented antidepressants, all these ties to Big Pharma surely raise questions about the reliability of the study.

‘Severe, protracted antidepressant withdrawal’

Dr James Davies is an Associate Professor at the University of Oxford and a practicing Psychotherapist. He told the Canary: 

Many academics, clinicians, and service users are deeply concerned about the implications of this review, which dangerously downplays the existence of antidepressant withdrawal. 

Tens of thousands of patients on online forums are currently reporting severe, protracted withdrawal, suffering without adequate support. This review not only denies their lived reality but risks further marginalising their voices. It may encourage clinicians to once again taper medication too quickly, or misinterpret withdrawal symptoms as a relapse, despite the growing body of evidence distinguishing the two.

Worryingly, the review aligns with longstanding pharmaceutical industry narratives that minimise harms, and many of its authors have long lists of pharma financial ties. Its publication and promotion risk turning back the clock on progress made over the past decade in recognising patient experiences and advocating for informed and cautious prescribing. Rather than advancing patient safety and public health, this review significantly threatens both.

Featured image via Tokino/Wikimedia Commons