Thoughts on Peter Kramer's "depression"

Thoughts on "There's Nothing Deep About Depression By PETER D. KRAMER":

Peter Kramer misleads his readers asserting that “. . . depression is a disease like any other. . . not a perspective,” (“There's Nothing Deep About Depression,” April 17). Depression is not a disease for several reasons: Diseases are lesions of the body and found in the cadaver at autopsy. Depression is not found in a cadaver. Depression has symptoms, no signs. Depression is diagnosed through conversation, not blood tests. It takes at least two people to be depressed, and only one person to have a disease. Thought and behavior is always accompanied by change in the body. That is different from saying physical changes cause thought and behavior. If depression is a disease, so is courage, heroism, love, and faith. It can't be that just bad things are caused by the brain. In fact, life itself must be a disease, for surely we are each genetically programmed to die. --- JAS


MAGAZINE DESK April 17, 2005, Sunday There's Nothing Deep About Depression By PETER D. KRAMER (NYT) 2901 words Late Edition - Final , Section 6 , Page 50 , Column 1 DISPLAYING FIRST 50 OF 2901 WORDS - Shortly after the publication of my book ''Listening to Prozac,'' 12 years ago, I became immersed in depression. Not my own. I was contented enough in the slog through midlife. But mood disorder surrounded me, in my contacts with patients and readers. To my mind, my book was never really...
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