ABSTRACT

In 1997, during the heyday of what has been labelled the 'business of selling mental disease and psychotropic drugs', David Healy published his book, The Antidepressant Era. In the postscript, Healy argued that the majority of people who meet diagnostic criteria for depression or anxiety seek treatment for a condition, which in principle cannot scientifically be shown to specifically benefit from available treatments. This chapter shows that the addictive promise of the psychoactive magic bullet with a controllable and specific effect on the chemistry of the brain has not and will not materialize due to the complex and contextualized nature of mental disorders. The historiography of psychiatry has shown that relatively little attention has been given to the use of psychotropic drugs or other bodily cures in mental health care. The chapter explores the direct and indirect paths that shape the holy grail of neuro-psychopharmacology and biological psychiatry with 'happiness pills', 'emotional aspirins', 'mood' molecules, and 'mood' genes or biomarkers.