Effects of COVID-19 on the consumption of antidepressants in the Province of Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Canary Islands

Abstract

This work analyzed the impact of COVID-19 on antidepressant consumption during the first year of the pandemic (2020) taking as a baseline the prescribing trends during the previous 4 years (2016-2019). For this, the province of Santa Cruz de Tenerife and the 4 islands that make it up were taken as a geographical area. Sales data in community pharmacies were taken as an aggregated database. The dose per inhabitant and day was used as an indicator of consumption. In the islands of EL Hierro and La Gomera, the increase in population does not in itself justify the relevant increases observed in the consumption of antidepressants and possibly COVID-19 and its consequences on the health of the population could be responsible for these increases. On the island of Tenerife, the increase in population could justify, to a large extent, the slight increase in consumption observed. The island of La Palma presents an increase of 1.40%, but lower than the expected value taking as baseline the prescribing trends in the last 4 years, despite an increase in population of 0,95%. All the islands present the same trends in the consumption of the different subgroups of antidepressants and active pharmaceutical ingredients, although with slight variations, with the exception of the island of La Palma which presents a statistically different behavior and trends. These differences could be related to the socio-sanitary and demographic characteristics of each of the islands.