The warnings specifically are targeted at use of the drugs among children and adolescents. While the suicide rate of youth has generally declined during the past few years while antidepressant use has gone up, no clear causal relationship has been established.

However, a recent study by the Australian Adverse Drug Reactions Advisory Committee has suggested that antidepressants may actually increase suicidal thoughts in adolescents. The warnings are also most likely prompted by the concern that the drugs are over-prescribed, especially in children and teenagers.

"Doctors are going to be on the line not to prescribe them as if they were pacifiers," said Vera Hassner Sharav, president of the Alliance for Human Research Protection, a patient advocacy group based in New York.
The warnings are urged not only for the young, but anyone taking the drug, for psychiatric reasons, or not.

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