Reacción a "Link the consumption of lorazepam in the series 'The White Lotus' with an increase in Google searches for this anti-anxiety drug"

The study is small but carefully conducted and published in the journal JAMA of Health Forum, part of the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) group, one of the most prestigious and respected medical journals in the world. Its findings highlight an interesting phenomenon: how a popular series can influence public interest in a drug. Following the premiere of The White Lotus, internet searches for the anti-anxiety drug lorazepam increased by almost 100%, suggesting that fiction not only reflects reality, but can also shape it.

Although searching for information on Google does not necessarily mean that people are taking the drug, it does reflect a growing curiosity about psychotropic drugs and demonstrates the power of the media to spark interest in their use.

In countries such as Spain, this issue is particularly sensitive. According to the latest data from the EDADES 2024 survey, one in eight adults has taken hypnotics in the last year, and consumption among young people aged 15 to 24 has doubled in the last decade, in many cases without a prescription. In this context, audiovisual representations matter: if series show the use of anxiolytics lightly, they can contribute to normalising it. Just as scenes involving tobacco were limited to avoid its “glamorisation”, perhaps the time has come to accompany this type of content with messages or warnings that help to contextualise the risks and promote more responsible consumption.