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Lithium In Water "Curbs Suicide"
SpuriousLogic writes "Drinking water which contains lithium may reduce the risk of suicide, a Japanese study suggests. Researchers compared levels of lithium in drinking water to suicide rates in the prefecture of Oita, which has a population of more than one million. The suicide rate was significantly lower in those areas with the highest levels of lithium, they wrote in the British Journal of Psychiatry. And I was only worried about fluoridation affecting my precious bodily fluids before ..."
Concidering that Lithium is used to treat a number of mental illnesses like bipolar and depression that should be expected. Here in the US there are many living with undiagnosed depression and we are seen as a tollerant and accepting society in regards to mental health. In Japan there is far less social acceptance (at least when I lived there, maybe its changed) so I would expect and even higher percentage of non treated people.
(Hey, it worked for Inconvenient Truth. :P)
The World Wide Web is dying. Soon, we shall have only the Internet.
The idea that "scientists" are going to be spiking water supply with Li+, a freaking powerful mood stabilizing aka mood altering drug for the "Greater Good"?! My wildly successful but bipolar Boss took this stuff to deal with his manic lows, and it he would become a zombie. Everything he accomplished as a businessman he did BEFORE taking lithium. I would rather see funding and energy expended to reduce suicides without "stabilizing" the humanity into a calm herd.
I will not be pushed, filed, stamped, indexed, briefed, debriefed or numbered. My life is my own.
for its ability to suppress suicidal urges. It's significantly more effective at suicide reduction than any other drug available. For this reason, it's still commonly used for treating people with bipolar. Ironically, it's also one of the more toxic drugs and easy to commit suicide with.
Having drugs that reduce the incidence of suicide is extremely important especially for bipolar. Post diagnosis, there is approximately a 15 to 20% suicide rate for bipolar patients. I was almost in that 15 to 20% I know very clearly why people try to end their lives and I also know that if they're not terminally ill, it can and should be prevented.
If a friend or family member is seriously down, withdraws from social circles (and not just because they're on a bataan death march coding project), start giving away belongings or are talking about how it hurts too much to stay alive, ask them these three questions.
Do you have a plan to kill yourself? (Ask how)
do you have the materials to kill yourself with?
Do you have a place/time for killing yourself?
A single yes means stay close, call mental health in the morning. Two yeses or more means get the person to the emergency room and tell the doctor about these questions and responses. If the person will not go with you, call the emergency room, tell them what's going on and they will send emergency personnel to help.
Almost all people thinking of suicide will give you signals and, even though they may not show it, want someone to stop them. Most importantly, if you try and they kill themselves anyway, don't blame yourself.
You absolutely in no circumstances can ethically give a healthy person mind-altering substances without their consent... People quoted who say it's interesting for potential are on a massive ego trip.
You could try Zen Buddhism. I went from having to do wacked out shit all the time to get my highs to being able to enjoy previously boring stuff like just paying attention to my breath or eating a salad.
No, sorry I'm a little too old to watch teen films/shows.
How do you make life not suck so much? Seriously -- is it better pay? Free sex? More leisure time? I am depressed about 90% of the time and have been since I was 16 (I'm 40 now). I work part-time (about 3 days/week on average), make a (barely) six figure income, and my wife is bi. I'm not making up a word of this. I should feel incredibly happy, but instead, a life-long sense of despair prevents exactly that.
I think there is a good part of depression that is due to external forces. I can say that when I was poor, it was worse. But a large part of depression is wholly internal and no amount of "making life suck less" is going to change that.
Perhaps if people didn't generally spend 1/7 of their life in a large building with a well-dressed man telling them they're going to hell because they were born a bad person, they'd feel better.
Better pay, free sex, and more leisure time are nice, but won't make you as happy as realizing that you really ARE a good person and accepting it. Accepting and living with it is probably more difficult in this sadist society.
Bullshit. 95% of today's teens are atheist, and they still kill themselves. Christians are actually probably less likely to commit suicide, simply because it's considered a sin.
People, please stop tagging every study on Slashdot with correlationisnotcausation. I know it's standard here to believe this community is somehow more enlightened than all others, but do you really think that researchers became researchers without being able to ask simple questions? In fact, in an idealized study, it's not even a relevant question!
Moreover, this moronic practice is especially stupid for this story because the neurological effects of lithium salts have been explored for decades. This is not a revolutionary study by any means. So unless years and years of studies have gone horribly wrong, then yes, in this case, correlation does, in fact, imply causation.
People generally don't drink enough water anyways.
"Why there haven't been studies using Lithium isotopes to trace the effects and identify the specific class(es) of condition(s) Lithium can deal with and which it can't, I don't know."
Because there is no patent on it, and thus no protected revenue stream.
In other words, not worth doing unless you possess a soul.
"Where they spike the water to cure aggression in people? It doesn't end well."
Who's to say curing aggression would have the same side effects as in stephen kings story? Real life is much more mundance and predictable, that's what makes it REAL LIFE(tm)
Funny thing about living through stressful difficult times is you learn to be content with what you have. I live in the third world under an undemocratic government and have a much lower standard of living than you guys, but I'm quite happy.
I'd say, its the old problem of the more you have, the more you want. Happiness has nothing to do with material wealth or possessions. Its a state of mind.
I have determined that my sig is indeterminate.
It's a song called Lithium written by a guy who killed himself... not too offtopic, really.
While what you say is true, it doesn't imply what I said is not true. I forget who said it, but some rich guy, when asked how much money was enough, answered, "just a little more.."
Chasing wealth to find happiness is a complete waste of time. And you will never be satisfied, if wealth is your only goal. You'll always want more.
This is why I will take a poor paying job in a research institute/university over some dead boring high paying 8-5 do the same thing every day job with a large salary(which I could easily get with my skills in this country). Because as long as I can live comfortably, I don't really care about the money. Maybe its just me.. but the truth is, I am actually happy. Strange as that may sound.
I have determined that my sig is indeterminate.