Psychiatrist Claims No Evidence Depression is Caused by Chemical Imbalance

What was said

"There is no evidence that you have a chemical imbalance in your brain if you are depressed. So therefore, there's no evidence that that antidepressant you're being offered is going to correct that. They haven't asked that question about what antidepressants might be doing by just messing about with our normal brain chemistry."

Dr. Joanna Moncrieff, a psychiatrist who published a major 2022 review, stated definitively that depression has not been proven to be caused by a chemical imbalance despite decades of this being the dominant narrative. She argued the psychiatric profession avoided investigating what long-term antidepressant use does to normal brain chemistry because they were focused on the false premise of correcting an imbalance. This challenges the foundational justification for prescribing antidepressants to millions.