Society
While Russians Are Increasingly Using Antidepressants, No ‘Prozac Culture’ Has Developed
February 13, 2026
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Rustam Alexander
Melbourne University and author of Red Closet: The Hidden History of Gay Oppression in the USSR and AIDS in Soviet Russia: A story of deception, despair and hope
In recent years, even though Russians have been buying more and more antidepressants, a culture around taking them has not taken root in Russia. This is partly because public figures are not yet ready to discuss antidepressants and mental health in general, as historian Rustam Alexander argues.
Zulfugar Karimov / Unsplash
In a striking yet unsurprising paradox, Russia, whose propaganda relentlessly attacks the West, is becoming increasingly dependent on Western-made antidepressants. Today, life in Russia offers no shortage of reasons for anxiety and depression, including, to name just a few, the ongoing war with Ukraine and “hidden” mobilization, political repression and a sharp economic slowdown that has led to widespread job losses. Russian pharmacies report rising sales of sertraline, fluoxetine and escitalopram (trade names: Zoloft, Prozac and Cipralex), so-called selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs). It was precisely this class of antidepressants that, nearly three decades ago, broke into Western markets and became a routine part of the everyday lives of millions of Americans.
It all began in the late 1950s, when the first antidepressant medications were developed almost simultaneously in the US and Europe. Both proved effective in treating chronically and severely depressed patients. However, these drugs came with significant side effects and carried serious risks in case of overdose. In the late 1980s, a new antidepressant called Prozac entered the US market and then quickly spread worldwide. It was an SSRI, which, compared with earlier antidepressants, was believed to treat depression and anxiety more effectively while causing far fewer side effects. Prozac was touted as a “wonder drug” that not only cured clinically depressed patients but also helped people who had no clinical depression to become more active, energetic, positive and even successful in their careers.
As the drug became wildly popular, many began to debate not only its effects on the health of users but also its broader cultural and social implications. For example, New York-based psychiatrist Peter Kramer controversially argued in his book Listening to Prozac that the drug could reshape personality itself, while writer Elizabeth Wurtzel, who was taking antidepressants herself, wrote the bestselling memoir Prozac Nation about her experience with depression. Her book further embedded Prozac in the American cultural imagination and even inspired a film adaptation. Some media outlets suggested that a full-fledged “Prozac culture” had emerged in the US. Prozac’s success paved the way for other SSRIs (among them is Zoloft, currently popular in Russia), which were soon approved and made available.
Today, after more than 35 years of widespread antidepressant use, Americans are increasingly questioning the safety and efficacy of SSRIs, drawing attention to their side effects. Many discussions also focus on how these drugs may disrupt a person’s sense of identity with some users uncertain about who they are without medication. This is taking place as countries like Russia have recently begun to embrace antidepressants on a mass scale.
Soviet psychiatrists framed depression as a short-term response to a set of purely personal problems, which could be helped with talk therapy and sedatives. When the USSR collapsed, Russia found itself in the throes of a series of profound economic and social crises and shocks. For many it was too much to take. In the mid-1990s, newspapers began to report on widespread depression in the country, encouraging readers to seek psychiatric help and even SSRIs, discussing them as a possible way to keep one’s sanity. Yet many Russians remained wary of psychiatrists and suspicious of Western antidepressants. Throughout the 2000s, even though celebrity psychiatrists such as Dr Kurpatov continued to raise public awareness of antidepressants in their books, these medications remained relatively uncommon.
It all began in the late 1950s, when the first antidepressant medications were developed almost simultaneously in the US and Europe. Both proved effective in treating chronically and severely depressed patients. However, these drugs came with significant side effects and carried serious risks in case of overdose. In the late 1980s, a new antidepressant called Prozac entered the US market and then quickly spread worldwide. It was an SSRI, which, compared with earlier antidepressants, was believed to treat depression and anxiety more effectively while causing far fewer side effects. Prozac was touted as a “wonder drug” that not only cured clinically depressed patients but also helped people who had no clinical depression to become more active, energetic, positive and even successful in their careers.
As the drug became wildly popular, many began to debate not only its effects on the health of users but also its broader cultural and social implications. For example, New York-based psychiatrist Peter Kramer controversially argued in his book Listening to Prozac that the drug could reshape personality itself, while writer Elizabeth Wurtzel, who was taking antidepressants herself, wrote the bestselling memoir Prozac Nation about her experience with depression. Her book further embedded Prozac in the American cultural imagination and even inspired a film adaptation. Some media outlets suggested that a full-fledged “Prozac culture” had emerged in the US. Prozac’s success paved the way for other SSRIs (among them is Zoloft, currently popular in Russia), which were soon approved and made available.
Today, after more than 35 years of widespread antidepressant use, Americans are increasingly questioning the safety and efficacy of SSRIs, drawing attention to their side effects. Many discussions also focus on how these drugs may disrupt a person’s sense of identity with some users uncertain about who they are without medication. This is taking place as countries like Russia have recently begun to embrace antidepressants on a mass scale.
Soviet psychiatrists framed depression as a short-term response to a set of purely personal problems, which could be helped with talk therapy and sedatives. When the USSR collapsed, Russia found itself in the throes of a series of profound economic and social crises and shocks. For many it was too much to take. In the mid-1990s, newspapers began to report on widespread depression in the country, encouraging readers to seek psychiatric help and even SSRIs, discussing them as a possible way to keep one’s sanity. Yet many Russians remained wary of psychiatrists and suspicious of Western antidepressants. Throughout the 2000s, even though celebrity psychiatrists such as Dr Kurpatov continued to raise public awareness of antidepressants in their books, these medications remained relatively uncommon.
Oscar Ochoa / Unsplash
The advent of the internet and specifically the rise of social media platforms such as YouTube changed everything in the 2010s. Some psychiatrists who had previously worked mainly in clinics started building online audiences. They created YouTube channels where they presented themselves as approachable professionals and visibly broke with Soviet-era images of punitive psychiatry. In their videos, they answered very specific questions from patients about antidepressants and other psychiatric medications, which contributed significantly to the destigmatization of antidepressants.
Meanwhile, the social, political and economic situation in Russia quickly took a turn for the worse. In spring 2014, Putin annexed Crimea and Western countries imposed economic sanctions on Russia, which led to a sharp weakening of the ruble.
Unsurprisingly, the shock brought back memories of the 1990s. In 2015, surveys by the Levada Center showed that many Russians had become depressed because of it, while Russia’s Izvestia daily argued that “antidepressants were becoming trendy” both because of the economic downturn and because doctors were paying more attention to the psychological health of their patients. Sales of antidepressants, as Izvestia reported in 2017, were buoying pharmacies’ revenues. They surged again after Putin launched his “special military operation” in February 2022, with demand being such that some drugs, including Prozac, were reportedly in short supply.
Russia’s public discourse about antidepressants (mainly online) is strikingly dry and pragmatic. It consists mainly of statistics about usage and sales of antidepressants, along with doctors’ comments on what works best, when to take them and how. Users share their journeys too. Yet the discourse rarely engages with the deeper questions that accompanied antidepressants (especially SSRIs) in the West, most notably in the US. It seems that a “Prozac culture” – with its language of self-exploration, identity and emotional reinvention – has not developed in Russia. Nor is there any attempt to glamorize or romanticize the experience of being depressed, as happened in parts of Western culture. Instead, antidepressants are presented simply as tools for coping with hardship – necessary, functional, devoid of meaning beyond their immediate utility.
That Russian psychiatrists do not engage with these questions is, perhaps, partly rooted in the Soviet legacy. In the USSR, psychoanalysis was banned and deemed unnecessary, while anything related to a person’s inner world was dismissed as superfluous Western exoticism. Sustained reflection on subjectivity, emotions and individual meaning never became an integral part of psychiatric culture.
As for Russia’s public intellectuals, they focus on the most pressing issue – the war in Ukraine – and many of them are also not comfortable with or accustomed to discussing mental health as a cultural and social phenomenon. And as for Russians who take antidepressants, many are not concerned with questions of selfhood, either. They are focused on survival. Issues of identity, emotional authenticity and inner transformation are secondary in the current circumstances. This does not mean, however, that the implications of Russia’s antidepressant culture (or lack thereof) are unworthy of reflection. On the contrary, this experience will eventually need to be examined and understood. For now, however, antidepressants in Russia are largely perceived for what they are: a means of not losing one’s mind in an increasingly unbearable and hostile society.
Meanwhile, the social, political and economic situation in Russia quickly took a turn for the worse. In spring 2014, Putin annexed Crimea and Western countries imposed economic sanctions on Russia, which led to a sharp weakening of the ruble.
Unsurprisingly, the shock brought back memories of the 1990s. In 2015, surveys by the Levada Center showed that many Russians had become depressed because of it, while Russia’s Izvestia daily argued that “antidepressants were becoming trendy” both because of the economic downturn and because doctors were paying more attention to the psychological health of their patients. Sales of antidepressants, as Izvestia reported in 2017, were buoying pharmacies’ revenues. They surged again after Putin launched his “special military operation” in February 2022, with demand being such that some drugs, including Prozac, were reportedly in short supply.
Russia’s public discourse about antidepressants (mainly online) is strikingly dry and pragmatic. It consists mainly of statistics about usage and sales of antidepressants, along with doctors’ comments on what works best, when to take them and how. Users share their journeys too. Yet the discourse rarely engages with the deeper questions that accompanied antidepressants (especially SSRIs) in the West, most notably in the US. It seems that a “Prozac culture” – with its language of self-exploration, identity and emotional reinvention – has not developed in Russia. Nor is there any attempt to glamorize or romanticize the experience of being depressed, as happened in parts of Western culture. Instead, antidepressants are presented simply as tools for coping with hardship – necessary, functional, devoid of meaning beyond their immediate utility.
That Russian psychiatrists do not engage with these questions is, perhaps, partly rooted in the Soviet legacy. In the USSR, psychoanalysis was banned and deemed unnecessary, while anything related to a person’s inner world was dismissed as superfluous Western exoticism. Sustained reflection on subjectivity, emotions and individual meaning never became an integral part of psychiatric culture.
As for Russia’s public intellectuals, they focus on the most pressing issue – the war in Ukraine – and many of them are also not comfortable with or accustomed to discussing mental health as a cultural and social phenomenon. And as for Russians who take antidepressants, many are not concerned with questions of selfhood, either. They are focused on survival. Issues of identity, emotional authenticity and inner transformation are secondary in the current circumstances. This does not mean, however, that the implications of Russia’s antidepressant culture (or lack thereof) are unworthy of reflection. On the contrary, this experience will eventually need to be examined and understood. For now, however, antidepressants in Russia are largely perceived for what they are: a means of not losing one’s mind in an increasingly unbearable and hostile society.
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