A new NHS report has revealed the highest ever levels of antidepressant use recorded in England, with roughly one in seven people prescribed an antidepressant item in 2025-26. This has resulted in a swathe of media coverage expressing alarm over the increase, with questions about what could, or should, be done to reverse the trend. Such a high level of antidepressant use should, of course, prompt concern and reflection.
But the popular claim that has taken hold is that antidepressant use is too high because of “overprescribing”, as Dr John Read, a professor of clinical psychology, says in the Daily Mail. This is the idea that patients are being prescribed antidepressants when they shouldn’t be, or when better, safer alternatives are available. This idea is worth challenging – but first it’s important to consider how we got here.
The increase in antidepressant use is strongly correlated with a rise in diagnoses in common disorders including depression and anxiety. Much of this is the afterlife of the Covid-19 pandemic and its associated lockdowns: according to ONS data, across Britain, the rate of depressive symptoms in adults doubled during the crisis to almost one in five. As of April 2025, the figures remain almost as high.
This surge has particularly affected young people in England, with one in four having a mental health condition, according to NHS data. So with this rise, an increase in antidepressant use is predictable. Lockdown, however necessary for public health, has had lasting implications for the country’s wellbeing.
But it’s not only the consequences of the pandemic. What this data also indicates is that persistent regional inequalities have a worsening effect on mental health outcomes, and therefore antidepressant use. The most dramatic increases in antidepressant use are found in the most impoverished regions of England, while more affluent regions report modest levels of antidepressant use.
The highest rate of antidepressant use was seen in patients treated under the North East and North Cumbria integrated care board, with 200 in every 1,000 people prescribed antidepressant medication. Consider that this ICB contains some of the country’s most deprived areas, which have “faced longstanding inequalities and poor health for decades”, and you have further proof of something that has long been clear: poverty is inextricably linked to poorer mental health outcomes. One key element that underpins many cases of depression, anxiety and related disorders is chronic stress.
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