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Comment by delichon | Hacker News Reader

> no one is getting rich selling anti-loneliness pills (yet)

Annual sales of antidepressants in North America are about $8 billion.

Not to mention the money grifters (à la manosphere freaks) rake in, or the regular reports of people using LLMs as therapists and friends.

Not sure what the point of closing your eyes and plugging your years is

Manosphere is more of a cause of loneliness of some men then the consequence of it. Likewise with LLM as therapists and friends.

Yes, but they start by giving those to children and teenagers, and telling them that if they ever stop taking the pills they'll kill themselves.

Like Focusyn?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brother%27s_Little_Helper

It's almost like the primary objective is to make money rather than 'protect the children'.

Doctors make nothing for prescribing SSRIs to kids

The don't get a direct kickback, but there is an absolutely massive campaign to influence prescription decisions right out in the open:

https://www.bmj.com/content/385/bmj.q781

FTA:

> Some 57% of US doctors received more than $12bn in payments related to medical drugs or devices from manufacturers between 2013 and 2022, an analysis has found.1 “Despite evidence that financial conflicts of interest may influence physician prescribing and may damage patients’ trust in medical professionals, such payments remain pervasive,” says the letter in JAMA.

Making lots of money protects the children of the shareholders from being poor. Perhaps even their childrens children. Or their childrens childrens children. /s

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