Children and young people given high doses of antidepressants are twice as likely to commit suicide as those on standard doses, a study has concluded.
For every 150 young people given high doses of the drugs, one will seek to harm themselves within a year, Harvard scientists found after looking at data on 163,000 US patients aged 10 to 24 prescribed drugs such as Prozac.
They said the findings should prompt doctors to avoid high doses of drugs in favour of other treatments and to closely monitor teenagers on antidepressants.
The study follows previous research that found people aged 18 to 24 given antidepressants were roughly twice as likely to be suicidal as those given a placebo, but it remains unclear how the drugs might