The illness being linked to the blues If you have
depression—something that affects an estimated 17% of
Americans—you already know it can seriously hamper your well-
being. And now a surprising new report suggests it might even up
your risk of something else: shingles. In a study published
online in Clinical Infections Diseases, researchers found a link
between untreated depression and decreased efficacy of the
vaccine designed to prevent shingles, a condition characterized
by painful, burning rashes. Researchers first vaccinated 92
adults against shingles, and then followed those participants
for two years. Those with untreated depression, it turns out,
didn’t respond to the vaccine in the same way as participants
being treated with antidepressants or participants who didn’t
suffer from depression at all. “I think in genera,l people have
the view that vaccines are fully protective,” says study author
Michael Irwin, MD, a professor of psychiatry at UCLA. “But in
fact, at least in older adults who aren’t taking