but it's going to run out just fine. nick: the chunk and run. jim: same putt to be made the 4 the first time. you thought that was going to be short. nick: it's a pretty good flavor if you stick around and carry on in the playoff. >> i'm not sure it's possible to hit a good-sounding chip off of kikuyu. nick: i agree. i think we're a little harsh. we take that one back. jim: mickelson will be next. >> i almost hate to say it, but this wouldn't surprise me either. nick: way easier putt and it's the same strategy or tactics. just main line it. just see it running, hitting the back of the hole. it doesn't matter about the it doesn't matter about the next one.

>> took a couple of serious bounces about halfway there. jim: keegan bradley will have a putt to win the golf tournament. nick: about as difficult as it gets. he holed that unbelievable one on the 17th to win the pga. that was just short of impossible. >> he's no stranger to this scene. might not have been around very long, but what he's seen has been pretty special. nick: he's got to just put the reins on himself, because if he doesn't make a rush at this one -- those other boys haven't got their 4's yet.

so you wouldn't want to shoot yourself in the foot. give it a go, but don't bash it. jim: oh! that close. he was ready to leap into the air. nick: had to check his heart beat there, didn't he? it was like yes, yes, yes, and no! what happened? yes -- oh! jim: just a little too much speed. nick: that was a good effort. so easy just to get sloppy or get scared of that one and just not commit to it. so actually it was a really good effort.

jim: we'll go right around the circle here with haas, mickelson, bradley. and again, bill had this exact putt, maybe a few inches outside of it in regulation. center cut it then. center cut it then. this side, right door. jim: now phil to move on. dead center. jim: now phil to move on.

just love the fact you're going to have all these decisions coming up. as much as i love 18 and it is a fascinating finishing hole, you get to a playoff in a tournament of this stature, and then you've got to come to the 10th hole and make some decisions. the drivable par 4. risk-reward. and now to make it all three moving on. no blood. that one was right side also. mark it down as a 4 and move on. nick: i think, as we've seen this week, the 10th is so difficult to hit. almost impossible to get it on the green. it's really making the decision where you want to miss it. you know, you've seen it. now you've seen the hole

location. where do you want to leave your chip shot or your bunker shot to try and get it close? jim: just because of the framing of it, it looks much wider than it is. gary mccord described it as about the width of a school bus. nick: yeah, there's the strategy from up above. it's all about the angle of the green. these guys are going to go for it. if they can just get it up, anything left of the green. >> nick, i can tell you that from when i went through here during regulation play, the wind has shifted again. it's more right to left now and not nearly so much into them as it was. >> well, here's the deal. we've got 312 yards. no birdies made by anybody

laying up today. so you know they're going to hit a driver or get something down there as far as they can, pin-high or past the groan so -- green. phil's got a 3-wood. going to try to get to the left of the green. this is where all the fun starts. >> gary, the thing here is a 4 might actually win this. >> no, there's no way a 4 wins this. >> i'm telling you. >> no, no, no. >> it's the sort of hole that it could happen. >> it could, but no, no, no. 312. >> you're right. 5 might do it. >> phil's getting ready to hit this big old swing with a hook. he hit it hard. >> it hooked too much. >> oh no. >> oh, no, no, no. nick: in the bunker's perfect, but -- >> why would you do that with a 3-wood, nick? a driver at least could get there. in the bunker or something, have a chance.

nick: with a driver, you're right. g straight at the flag. if it comes up in that front bunker, 20 feet from that. >> if you dropped it out of snoopy 2 right now, that's the only way you get anything close. i shouldn't say that. i've lost a lot with phil betting he couldn't do it. but he might be able to do it. so we've got the same strategy here with keegan. i think he'll probably aim this a little more to the left. he's going to go through all of his mannerisms now, getting that ball straight. it would save us a lot if he would get it on there straight the first time. if we have somebody with a laser to line it up for him. nick: this front of the green. >> left of that line. that's the perfect line. go left of that line, not right. talk to me, guys. he's leaning the wrong way. uh-oh. >> mangled it. it may fly over the corner of the bunker.

>> is this going to go in? oh no. david, you might be right. a bogey might win this. >> i did mention that. >> now, this is interesting, nick faldo. nick: got to go with driver. come on. get it there. >> get it past the green. nick: and he hits a nice little power fade. see -- >> the bottle brush trees to the left p stay out of those. looking left. >> it's in the trees. >> past it. ok. he might be all right. he's better than the other two guys, i'll tell you that. it's going to be some nice it's going to be some nice little shots here.

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jim: aerial coverage, and it's been superb. provided by our friends from metlife and snoopy 2. again tonight on cbs, "60 minutes," followed by the season premiere of "amazing race," "the good wife," and "csi: miami," only cbs. nick: gary, i'm saying only one player can hit the green, but i have no idea which one it's going to be. [laughter] >> and they're only 30 yards away, so it's really interesting. and the only guy to really birdie this hole today is the guy right there that you saw. and we saw the second shot, just about where he is. about 30 yards farther back. he had the perfect angle right up the hill. and again, those putts from back there are nasty. it's hard to read. a brilliant putt here.

watch how fast this is. doesn't look like it's possibly going to get there. that's down the middle. that's what i'm talking about. down the middle right there. just a little shot here, but phil's got to literally hit it up over the moon. and i'm going to see -- let's see if we get an angle. a camera back here. nick: bill's got the same. he's got a moon shot as well. >> he's got a marginal lie at best. has to come over the bunker if he goes right at the flag. and i see no way of stopping it on the green. >> if you're 30 yards away and you put the pin on the top of an igloo, that's the shot you've got. nick: so who's going to hit the green? >> can anybody hit the green? >> yes. phil has got a perfect lie. nick: you're kidding. after all that. >> and there is about a square yard just shrt of the green he can land it. like dropping it out of a sky

hook. and he has the shot. he can play this shot. >> this is going to be very entertaining, ladies and gentlemen. you know, we play all these holes in the pga. all of a sudden, you've got one of the shortest holes on the tour and these guys are having fits. they've looked at it from every different angle. they don't know what to do. nick: interesting. you might be crossing your mind, do i lay up to keep myself in the hole? >> oh, look at that lie. oh no. >> he's going right. lay it up on the par 4. you got to love this. laid up to about 40. >> may not be that bad, i tell you. >> no, he's going to make the other guys stare at it, right? >> that may look good. nick: get it inside. >> phil's got this thing popped up on a tee. i'd go right underneath this and leave it up there.

nick: this could be the shot of the year. >> this is the short of shot that there's very few people on the planet that can play this. you're looking at the best at it. and if it is going to happen, it will happen right now. maybe a square yard he can land this in and leave himself an uphill putt. >> flew it right at it. look at this. that's as good as he can do. >> he didn't get the contact he wanted. >> yeah, a little sloppy through it. >> that's the kikuyu again. you've got to clip it clean. >> what do we have here, david? do we have anything? >> he has -- you know, he's a one percenter. >> 1% up and down. one time out of 100. >> maybe better than that.

1% he hits the green. >> see how early he got in there? we could hear it. that blade was just about horizontal to the ground, the face. but you can see there about six inches behind it. you hear that kind of a slap sound. 1% chance to get it on the green. >> that's a good look at what he hasn't got. jim: is there a better play just going out sideways over there? >> no. >> he's going to loo look -- look sideways. >> you may as well try get it on close. >> i'm amazed he's got spit still left. [laughter] i mean, this has been a long day. there it is. there it is again. i only talk to keegan about the spitting. just listen to the sound now. that sounded fat.

a little fat. >> that is a phenomenal shot, no matter where it ends up. >> unbelievable. that is really, really good right there. it's giving yourself a chance. so all three guys -- a couple guys got a couple bumps. phil out of the bunker. he is ever dangerous. that's an uphill bunker shot right there. probably just skip it up and down. i don't know if anybody's going to make a birdie here. you can see he didn't have that blade wide open. pretty square coming in. ok. phil's practicing. haas has got his ball -- yeah, he's going to go first. >> he's definitely away. he'll be putting first. very difficult to read the green now with the shadows.

you have to be very, very precise at this point. >> what's really interesting, guys, is we were talking about can anybody hit the green. and if bill haas didn't lay up to the right. all three of these guys wouldn't hit this green in regulation. and the hole is 312. and the hole is 312. i love this little hole. >> well look what i did! i laid up a chip shot and i might just have something here. nick: i think he's going to have it all. wow. it will be tough to stay calm after having to lay upsideways, thinking what have i done to myself? and then he does that?

>> just good decision making, right, nick? nick: you just got to keep yourself in it. that was just brilliant, smart thinking. took his medicine. said to himself, i've just got to stay and have a shot. now watch these guys perform. >> i'd still be nervous with this shot with phil. >> yeah, i didn't see that >> yeah, i didn't see that coming. >> drug it. one down. looking for his second win in a row, and looks like it's stunted now. and we've got one guy left standing. >> i mean, what are the odds of bradley and mickelson making 3 at the last to tie bill haas,

and then bill haas making a 3 in the manner that he did here? they're astronomical. >> that 18th hole, i started to come in. we had a playoff hole. and i said nobody can birdie that 18th hole and you have to. you never see that ever. well both of them did. >> keegan bradley has a keen sense of the dramatic, it seems. >> he likes it here. he loves this stage. not a difficult putt. under any other circumstance. oh. >> wow. >> what a win for bill haas. what a great win for the pga tour. man, that was some great action coming down to the end.

wow, that was good stuff. jim: another come from behind sunday performance. bill haas is the winner here at the northern trust open. just an amazing day here at riviera. can you imagine? you have to pitch it out sideways, lay up, and still you drain it for the victory. tonight on cbs, "60 minutes," season premiere "amazing race," "the good wife," "csi: miami." it's been just a remarkable west coast run for us. can hardly wait to augusta. we'll see you there next. jim nantz, nick faldo saying so long. long. haas the winner in los angeles.

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>> stahl: harvard's irving kirsch has thrown a bomb into the medical establishment. his research challenges the effectiveness of antidepressants, which are taken by 17 million americans, which he says don't work, for most people, any better than a sugar pill. but people are getting better taking anti-depressants. i know them. >> oh, yes. >> stahl: we all know them. >> people get better when they take the drug. but it's not the chemical ingredients of the drugs that are making them better. it's largely the placebo effect. >> simon: magnus carlsen is the best in the world. just look at what he's doing. competing against ten players simultaneously. that in itself is not extraordinary, but magnus cannot see the boards. he's facing the other way. so he has to keep track of the positions of 320 pieces blind.

and the number of possible moves? infinite. ( applause ) it transcends chess. i mean, i just can't fathom what you've done. it seems supernatural. >> i'm steve kroft. >> i'm lesley stahl. >> i'm morley safer. >> i'm bob simon. >> i'm lara logan. >> i'm scott pelley. those stories tonight on "60 minutes." as the years go by, some questions loom large. are you prepared for your retirement years - 25 or more of them? do you have a financial plan for you family that works, in good times and in bad times? having the right perspective can help you answer the big questions. for more than 140 years, pacific life has helped find answers for those navigating the path to financial security. ask a financial professional about pacific life - the power to help you succeed.

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>> pelley: we've seen some improvement in the job market lately. but there's something stubborn about unemployment. never in the last 60 years has the length of joblessness been this long. four million people, a full third of the unemployed, have been out of work more than a year. they've been severed from the workforce. ben bernanke, chairman of the federal reserve, calls it "a national crisis."

to understand what's happening, we went to stamford, connecticut, to see an experiment that might just offer a way back for americans trapped in unemployment. >> frank o'neill: they started to go through round after round of layoffs, and i got caught in one of the layoffs there. >> pelley: the great recession arrived early for frank o'neill. >> o'neill: it was a cold day in february. >> pelley: it was february, 2008. o'neill was a credit consultant for an i.t. company. what happened? >> o'neill: they called me into the vice president's office. and he basically told me that they were having some financial difficulty and told me that my last day was going to be that day. i got a small, little severance out of it and was off into the world of the unemployed. >> pelley: what have the last three years been like for you? >> o'neill: you have those moments, you know, where you're the only one in the house, and you're sitting in front of the computer looking for a job and you go, "when's this ever going to break for me?"

>> pelley: how many people have signed up for unemployment? everybody. no one we met in stamford expected to be out of work this long. how many have run to the end of the unemployment benefits? everyone. those unemployment benefits end after 99 weeks. these folks have been out of work two years, three, even four. they're college educated professionals in their 40s or 50s, people who thought their company would take them all the way to retirement. vernon? >> vernon downes: i was very angry. i was very bitter. i was fed up with society, the corporate world, the lies, deceit, the greed. >> pelley: they don't look it, but they have fallen out of the middle class-- turned in cars, gone on food stamps, taken kids out of college, and faced foreclosure. now, they've pinned their last hopes on joe carbone. >> joe carbone: the word "carnage" is a strong word, but

i can't think of a better word, in this case, and what aggravates me is that there isn't outrage. we ought to be angry. we ought to be giving every moment of our time figuring out how we're going to restore, for them, the american dream. >> pelley: joe carbone is president of something called the workplace. it's the state unemployment office in southwest connecticut where people get job training and placement help. carbone has a reputation for innovative job programs. but he has never seen so many people out of work so long. >> carbone: there is no comparison to being unemployed for six months and being unemployed for 99 weeks. your needs change in a drastic way. >> pelley: and what is the change? >> carbone: the change is the mind. that two years of unemployment erodes your self-confidence, your self-esteem. it separates you from your profession, your education, whatever you might have done previously.

there's all sorts of things. it causes divorces. it causes problems with children. >> pelley: what's insidious is how hidden these people are. carbone's territory has some of the richest towns in the nation. the commuter lines are arteries to the heart of corporate power in new york. but a lot of people walking around in suits haven't had a job in years. >> carbone: my job is to get people into a career. >> pelley: carbone has more than 12,000 who have spent their last unemployment check with no where to go. >> carbone: i can't tell you how this bothers me. i can't tell you what this has done to me. it's not just the numbers. it's... scott, it's the stories that you've heard. >> inside, you feel like a part of you has been ripped out from losing a job. >> pelley: this is how joe carbone intends to restore their american dream. he calls it "platform to employment." it's a half-million dollar program that he raised the money for from businesses and charities.

we went along for five weeks as a class of 28 learned how to claw their way back to employment. >> downes: i was so ashamed to reach out for help because i felt discouraged. i felt ashamed that i had failed. >> pelley: vernon downes was a project manager for a company that made medical devices. he's been working to find a job for two and a half years. >> downes: i've done everything that i was told to do-- the education, the certification-- and i still couldn't get a job. >> pelley: he's on food stamps, found work with a landscape company, and was glad to get it. >> downes: so then i said "okay, if i have to do leaf blowing to get some sort of an income, i'm willing to do that." and that's what i'm doing and that's how i get by day to day. >> pelley: did any of you wonder whether you were the only one? >> yeah. absolutely. >> diane graham: it was a very isolating experience for me. >> pelley: diane graham was an executive assistant. for three years, she's been

scraping together part-time work. but she's on food stamps, and she had to move in with her sister. >> graham: i was possibly looking at... looking at homelessness. so, i... i was terrified. >> carbone: our goal objective of platform to employment-- "p2e"-- is to reconnect you to the workforce. >> pelley: they're in class four days a week, and the very first thing they learned was to confront their fears and depression. >> graham: for me, it's been just debilitating fear that i won't be able to take care of myself. >> carbone: the resume-- the resume very soon will become an obsolete tool in the job search process. >> pelley: they were introduced to how much has changed since the last time they got a job. >> carbone: when they're considering hiring you for a job, they're going to go to the internet and see what comes up. if you have nothing that shows up, you're not relevant. >> pelley: they practiced job interviews. >> i'm noticing a gap, frank. it's looking really good up

until about 2008, so could you give me a little explanation about what happened there. >> pelley: and they learned to navigate the new bias, the unspoken reason they've been turned down again and again. did you ever have the sense that you and others were being discriminated against because of how long you'd been unemployed? >> o'neill: there's no doubt. i mean, i've seen it in print, whether it's some newspaper ads or online during those types of advertisements, i've actually seen, "if you are unemployed, you need not apply." >> pelley: just look at the web. you see the phrase everywhere, "must be currently employed." businesses can't legally discriminate by age, race or sex, but there's a new minority group now, the long-term unemployed. everybody knows we're in a terrible state in this country. why would a stigma attach to being unemployed for a year or two or three?

>> carbone: i mean, there's a sense that, if a person's out of work for a year or longer, they might be lazy; they might very well be people that would prefer to be home; or "they've lost too much already to be useful to me." it's unfair and it's wrong. we can use a search bar on facebook. >> pelley: platform to employment was a little like boot camp. >> carbone: there's hundreds of social media sites, but linkedin, it's the number one for anything professional. >> "managing director, ibm." >> pelley: and over time, we saw something new-- confidence. >> downes: what the program has done for me, it brought vernon back. i know who i am. i know this is the vernon that i know. that other person, for the past post-2009, i didn't know who that was. so i'm back. i'm back in the game. >> o'neill: i was so prideful and so stubborn that i would not apply for part-time positions. i wasn't going to go work at the grocery store nearby, i wasn't

going to go flip burgers. "i have a college education, i've been successful at work, i've been working for 30 years. i'm not doing this." so, when this opportunity for platform to employment came along, i joined it and it changed my mindset. >> pelley: after the classes are over, platform to employment opens the door on its biggest innovation-- it's an internship with a business that's looking to hire. tell me what that first day was like walking through the door. >> o'neill: it was nice to be a part of the workforce, having to go to work in the morning, rather than get up in the morning and go look for work. >> pelley: here, the office intern isn't a college student, he's 50-something, educated and experienced. for eight weeks, frank o'neill would work at cain management, which owns fast food restaurants. platform to employment pays o'neill's salary. what do you have to prove, and

how do you think that's going to work out? >> o'neill: they told me right off the bat, "we have a job and it's got to get done. and you need to prove yourself that you're the person who can get this job done for us." >> pelley: fair enough. >> o'neill: absolutely. all we're looking for is an opportunity. >> pelley: 100 people are enrolled in platform to employment and, after five months, 53 have jobs. vernon downes found work in his field, information technology, at a company called career resources. diane graham got a call. after three years of hearing "no," she didn't know how to respond to "yes." >> graham: the manager called me. you know, he gave me the brief details. "we'd like to have you on board, like to start monday." and i... i really froze on the phone. and i think he... he sensed it, because he said to me, "you know, you take few minutes to think about it and call me back." and i... and when i hung up the phone, i'm like, "is... are you crazy? what do i have to think about?" i was just really, really in shock. i was just not expecting it all.

>> good to see you. >> pelley: she's working at lex products, which makes power systems for industry. >> graham: being in the hustle bustle of everybody going to work-- i missed that. i truly missed it. >> pelley: it's not just about a paycheck. >> graham: no. no, no. wherein, in the past, it might have been, but this has become about my dignity. >> pelley: and at the end of his internship, frank o'neill heard from the boss. you just got a new job. >> o'neill: yes, i did. brings a smile to my face. >> pelley: i see that. where do you see yourself three months from now? employed? >> yeah. yes. yes. >> pelley: yes? oh, everybody. on graduation day, there was quite a change in the people that we first met that first day in class. >> vernon downes. ( applause ) >> pelley: joe carbone hopes his experiment might be a model for the other four million and counting whose lives have been

broken by the great recession. i wonder if you have a message to all of those people, the 38,000 people a week who join this group, who've run out of their unemployment checks and still have no prospects? >> carbone: i can't promise people jobs, but i can promise that we've taken a big step. and the steps will continue. i want them to know that help is on the way. we're not going to stop until the issue is addressed in a fair and honorable, honest and american way. [ male announcer ] what if you had thermal night-vision goggles, like in a special ops mission? you'd spot movement, gather intelligence with minimal collateral damage. but rather than neutralizing enemies in their sleep, you'd be targeting stocks to trade. well, that's what trade architect's heat maps do. they make you a trading assassin. trade architect. td ameritrade's empowering, web-based trading platform.

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>> stahl: the medical community is at war, battling over the scientific research and writings of a psychologist named irving kirsch. the fight is about antidepressants and kirsch's questioning of whether they work. kirsch's views are of vital interest to the 17 million americans who take the drugs, including children as young as six, and to the pharmaceutical industry that brings in $11.3 billion a year selling them. irving kirsch is the associate director of the placebo studies program at harvard medical school, and he says that his

research challenges the very effectiveness of antidepressants. >> irving kirsch: the difference between the effect of a placebo and the effect of an antidepressant is minimal for most people. >> stahl: and you're saying, if they took a sugar pill, they'd have the same effect? >> kirsch: they'd have almost as large an effect, and whatever difference there would be would be clinically insignificant. >> stahl: but people are getting better taking antidepressants. i know them. >> kirsch: oh, yes. >> stahl: we all know them. >> kirsch: people get better when they take the drug. but it's not the chemical ingredients of the drugs that are making them better. it's largely the placebo effect. >> stahl: irving kirsch's specialty has been the study of the placebo effect-- the taking of a dummy pill without any medication in it that creates an expectation of healing that is so powerful, symptoms are actually alleviated. >> kirsch: this is the placebo response... >> stahl: kirsch, who's been studying placebos for 36 years,

says sugar pills can work miracles. >> kirsch: placebos are great for treating a number of disorders-- irritable bowel syndrome, repetitive strain injuries, ulcers, parkinson's disease. >> stahl: even traumatic knee pain. in this clinical trial, some patients with osteoarthritis underwent knee surgery, while others had their knees merely opened and then sewn right back up. >> kirsch: and here's what happened. in terms of walking and climbing, the people who got the placebo actually did better... >> stahl: come on. >> kirsch: ...than the people who got the real surgery. >> stahl: no. >> kirsch: and that lasted for a year. at two years after surgery, there was no difference at all between the real surgery and the sham surgery. >> stahl: is it all in your head or...? >> kirsch: well, it's not all in your head, because the placebos can also affect your body. so if you take a placebo tranquilizer, you're likely to have a lowering of blood pressure and pulse rate. placebos can decrease pain. and we know that's not all in the mind also, because we can track that using neuro-imaging in the brain, as well.

>> stahl: he says the doctors who prescribe the pills become part of the placebo effect. >> kirsch: a clinician who cares, who takes the time, who listens to you, who asks questions about your condition and pays attention to what you say, that's the kind of care that can help facilitate a placebo effect. >> stahl: he says he got into researching the effect of antidepressants by accident. >> kirsch: i was interested in evaluating the size of the placebo effect. i really didn't even care about the drug effect because everybody, including me, knew it worked. i used to refer patients to get prescriptions. i didn't change the focus of my work onto looking at the drug effect until i saw the data from our first analysis. >> stahl: what he saw was that it almost didn't matter what kind of pill doctors gave patients. >> kirsch: we even looked at drugs that are not considered antidepressants-- tranquilizers, barbiturates. and do you know what? they had the same effect as the antidepressants.

>> stahl: come on. >> kirsch: really. >> stahl: kirsch was so surprised by his initial findings, he decided to do a second study using data not only from the drug companies' clinical trials that had been published in medical journals. this time, he got data that weren't published but had been submitted to the fda, which he got through the freedom of information act. >> kirsch: these are the studies that showed no benefit of the antidepressant over the placebo. what they did is they took the more successful studies, they published most of them. they took their unsuccessful studies and they didn't publish them. >> stahl: so when you did your study, you put all the trials together? >> kirsch: that's right. >> stahl: you're looking at patients who took the real drug and patients who took the placebo. >> kirsch: yes. >> stahl: did they get equally better, or did the ones who took the pills get even a little better? >> kirsch: if they were mildly

or moderately depressed, you don't see any real difference at all. the only place where you get a clinically meaningful difference is at these very extreme levels of depression. >> stahl: now look, psychiatrists say the drug works. >> kirsch: right. >> stahl: the drug companies and their scientists say the drug works. maybe you're wrong. >> kirsch: maybe. i'd add to that, by the way, patients say the drugs work. >> stahl: patients say the drug works. >> kirsch: and, for the patients and the psychiatrists, it's clear why they would say the drug works. they take the drug, they get better. our data show that, as well. >> stahl: you're just saying why they get better. >> kirsch: that's right. and the reason they get better is not because of the chemicals in the drug. the difference between drug and placebo is very, very small, and in half the studies, non- existent. >> stahl: kirsch and his studies have triggered a furious counterattack, mainly from psychiatrists, who are lining up to defend the use of antidepressants. like dr. michael thase, a

professor of psychiatry at the university of pennsylvania school of medicine, who has been a consultant to many of the drug companies. irving kirsch says that depressants are no better than placebo for the vast majority of people with depression, the vast majority. do you agree with that? >> dr. michael thase: no. no, i don't agree. i think you're confusing, or he's confusing, the results of studies versus what goes on in practice. >> stahl: he says that kirsch's statistical analysis overlooks the benefits to individual patients. >> thase: have a seat. >> stahl: and while he agrees there's a substantial placebo effect... >> thase: have you been keeping track of your depression scores? >> stahl: ...especially for the mildly depressed, using a different methodology, he finds that the drugs help 14% of those moderately depressed, and even more for those severely depressed. >> thase: our own work indicates pretty convincingly that this is a large and meaningful effect

for a subset of the patients in these studies. >> stahl: but even by your own numbers, more people-- maybe twice as many people-- are having a placebo effect than are actually being helped by the drug. >> thase: that's correct. >> stahl: in the moderate range? >> thase: that's correct. >> stahl: and this isn't troubling to you? >> thase: i wish our antidepressants were stronger. i hope we have better ones in the future. but that 14% advantage over and above the placebo is for a condition that afflicts millions of people, that represents hundreds of thousands of people who are better parents, who are better workers, who are happier, and who are less likely to take their life. >> stahl: since the introduction of prozac in the 1980s, prescriptions for these drugs have soared 400%... >> i used to be happy. i remember being happy... >> stahl: ...with the drug companies having spent billions over the years advertising them. i don't know about you, but i'm seeing more women running through daisy fields after looking morose than ever before. >> dr. walter brown: absolutely.

there's a lot of hype out there. >> stahl: dr. walter brown is a clinical professor of psychiatry at brown university's medical school. he has co-authored two studies that largely corroborate kirsch's findings. >> brown: the number of antidepressant prescriptions over the last decade has increased and, most troublesome, the biggest increase is in the mildly depressed, who are the ones who are least likely to benefit from them. >> stahl: he says they're getting virtually no benefit from the chemical in the pill. like most experts, he says these drugs do work for the severely depressed, but he questions the widely held theory that depression is caused by a deficiency in the brain chemical called serotonin, which most of these pills target. >> brown: the experts in the field now believe that that theory is a gross oversimplification and probably is not correct. >> stahl: and the whole idea of

antidepressants is built around this theory? >> brown: yes, it is. >> stahl: to approve any drug, the food and drug administration merely requires that companies show their pill is more effective than a placebo in two clinical trials, even if many other drug trials failed. >> brown: the f.d.a., for antidepressants, has a fairly low bar. a new drug can be no better than placebo in ten trials, but if two trials show it to be better, it gets approved. >> stahl: does that make sense to you? >> brown: that's not the way i would do it if i were the king, but i'm not. ( laughs ) >> stahl: dr. tom laughren, director of the fda's division of psychiatry products, defends the approval process. we're told you discard the negatives. is that not right? >> dr. tom laughren: we consider everything that we have. we look at those trials individually. >> stahl: but how are you

knowing that the two positives deserve bigger strength in the decision? >> laughren: getting that finding of a positive study by chance, if there isn't really an effect, is very low. that's... i mean, that's basic statistics, and that's the way clinical trials are interpreted. a separate question is whether or nor the effect that you're seeing is clinically relevant. >> stahl: okay. is it clinically relevant? >> laughren: the data that we have shows that the drugs are effective. >> stahl: but what about the degree of effectiveness? >> laughren: i think we all agree that the changes that you see in the short-term trials, the difference between improvement in drug and placebo, is rather small. >> stahl: it's a moderate difference. >> laughren: it's a small... it's a modest difference. >> stahl: it's so modest that, in great britain, the national health service decided to dramatically revamp the way these drugs are prescribed. it did so after commissioning

its own review of clinical trials. >> dr. tim kendall: we came to the conclusion that, for mild to moderate depression, these drugs probably weren't worth having. >> stahl: at all. >> kendall: not really. >> stahl: dr. tim kendall, a practicing psychiatrist and co- director of the commission that did the review, says that, like irving kirsch, they were surprised by what they found in the drug companies' unpublished data. >> kendall: with the published evidence, it significantly overestimated the effectiveness of these drugs and it underestimated the side effects. >> stahl: the fda would say that some of these unpublished studies are unpublished because there were flaws in the way the trials were conducted. >> kendall: this is a multi- billion dollar industry. i doubt that they are spending $10 million per trial to come up with a poor methodology. what characterizes the unpublished is that they're

negative. now, i don't think it's that their method is somehow wrong; it's that their outcome is not suitable, from the company's point of view. >> stahl: because of the review, new public health guidelines were issued. now, drugs are given only to the severely depressed as the first line of treatment. for those with mild to moderate depression, the british government is spending nearly half a billion dollars training an army of talk therapists. >> if you want to go a little faster, you can. >> stahl: physical exercise is another treatment prescribed for the mildly depressed. >> kendall: by the end of ten weeks, you get just as good a change in their depression scores as you do at the end of ten or 12 weeks with an antidepressant. >> stahl: none of the drug companies we spoke to was willing to go on camera, but eli lilly told us in an email that drug trials show antidepressants work better than placebos over

the long term, and that "numerous studies have shown that patients on placebos are more likely to relapse" back into depression. the industry's trade association, phrma, wrote us: "antidepressants have been shown to be tremendously effective." but if irving kirsch has his way, the drug companies will have to completely rethink their $11.3 billion business. you're throwing a bomb into this. this is huge, what you're saying. >> kirsch: i know that. the problem is that you can get the same benefit without drugs. i think more are beginning to agree, and i think things have begun to change. >> stahl: everyone in this story says that, if you're depressed, you should see your doctor, and if you're already on these powerful drugs, you shouldn't stop taking them on your own. >> go to 60minutesovertime.come to hear more about how the powerful placebo effect works.

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