British Kid is Sad: Stop the Presses

Over in the U.K., the Daily Mail is having a slow news day: they published an entire story about a four-year-old girl who's sad and may need to go on Prozac.

(She may be even more depressed when she gets older and realizes that her predicament -- and her picture -- got worldwide attention thanks to Matt Drudge. And, of course, her publicity-seeking mum. Good going, Mommie Dearest!)

In reality, plenty of preschoolers are popping pills to make them feel better. I wrote about the phenomenon for Wired News back in 2004:

According to experts, a growing number of parents are... reluctantly agreeing to treat theiryoung children with antidepressants even though their effects on thebrains of adults, let alone children, are little understood. "This isignorance in the broadest sense of the term," said Dr. Glen R. Elliott,
a child psychiatrist at the University of California at San Francisco. "We don't know if this is a good idea or not."