I MUST take issue with Kerry Hudson's article ("Like so many Scots, I take antidepressants. That’s exactly why we’d make good cops", The Herald, August 2). It suggests that Prozac and anti-depressants are the cure-all for depression and they are most certainly not. My experience of clinical depression over a period of some 50 years tells me otherwise. As a matter of fact some professionals suggest that extended use of anti-depressants can lead to suicidal thoughts.

I can testify that using them alone does not prevent anyone making bad decisions and feeling horrible. I made flawed decisions in my family life, professional life and with my friends over a long period while taking Prozac.

If you suffer from depression the first thing you have to do is share it. There should be no stigma. See your doctor and hope you don't get one like Ms Hudson's who will issue anti-depressants after giving a "cursory glance" to a form you fill in and then tell you that "some women actually lose weight on them". I consider that most irresponsible.

Ms Hudson says a blister pack of Prozac changed her life. I'm glad to hear that, but for many it has been a nightmare. Depression and clinical depression has to handled by a combination of medication and cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) and a healthy dose of self-examination and understanding. There is no magic pill. CBT has to be made more readily available to help those struggling with this illness.

Ms Hudson says: "If a childminder said they were on anti-depressants, I would feel 100% safer giving my child to them because I knew they were self-aware and strong enough to seek help." That is unmitigated nonsense. I would never have harmed my sons, but I knew when my wife had to look after their wellbeing and I had no idea when that would have to be, so I most certainly would not have let a childminder who was suffering as I was look after them.

In depression triggers can be pulled at any time. I have finished two years of CBT and I am on a low dose of medication. To fellow sufferers I would say it can get better but it takes a lot of work and support from friends, family and the professionals.

Ian Ramsden, Paisley.

Read more: Like many folk, I take antidepressants. That's why we'd make good cops

There are many famous Belgians

I NOTE Alan Simpson's resort to the tired old stereotype that there are somehow no famous Belgians apart from "Tintin and Audrey Hepburn" ("If Nessie didn’t exist, we’d have to invent her", The Herald, August 4).

While we in Scotland can number figures from the long-ago past among our cultural icons, it should be understood that Belgium is a comparatively modern country, which only attained independent status in its current form in the 19th century. If this were not the case then artists such as Van Eyck, Rubens, Van Dyck and Breughel the Younger might reasonably be considered Belgian masters rather than Flemish ones, while the great 20th century surrealist Rene Magritte certainly was fully Belgian in the modern sense.

Film actor Jean-Claude Van Damme may not be everybody's cup of tea, but he does qualify as internationally famous, while I am sure there are many Herald readers who could only wish we could have found some Scottish ancestry for footballers such as Vincent Kompany, Eden Hazard and Kevin De Bruyne. Former world No 1 tennis player Kim Clijsters is an athlete with an international profile, while the legendary Eddie Merckx is one of the truly great athletes in cycling history.

In the field of the arts, novelist Georges Simenon had a long and highly successful career, while singer/songwriter Jacques Brel, after whom there is a bar named in Glasgow's West End, was a cultural icon to many, including our own great, Alex Harvey. While I am sure there will be many Herald readers who can name others whom I have omitted, no list of famous and worthy Belgians would be complete without the inclusion of the inventor of the saxophone, Adolphe Sax, and the world's greatest guitarist, Django Reinhardt.

There is no question that, as Scots, we can be proud of the great contribution made by many of our countryfolk to the cultural landscape of the modern world, but, equally, we should not be tempted into patriotic arrogance, which is a most unattractive character trait.

David Gray, Glasgow.

Another disgrace for Glasgow

LIKE George Dale (Letters, August 4) I was disappointed, but not surprised, by the tatty funfair rides cluttering up the front of the Riverside Museum. The very fact that there’s enough space for a funfair is one indicator of how badly designed the museum is, with such a large part of the area wasted, but then the many inadequacies of the Riverside are a subject for another letter.

Directly across the river, the embarrassment that is the Glasgow Science Centre Tower, reopened in May, was closed yet again, and probably just as well.

The area around the tower is a disgrace, any current visitors to Glasgow would be greeted by broken paving, barriers, cones, weeds and all old skip. Not good enough.

Stuart Neville, Clydebank.

Green for keeping going

THE way to cure to the problem of time-wasting in football ("Stop the clock: Scottish game right to join the crack down on time wasters", Herald Sport, August 4, and Letters, August 5) is to introduce green cards.

Green cards in rugby, hockey and other sports have significantly improved these games and I do not understand why this has not happened in football. Not only would this reduce time-wasting but, if introduced for shirt-pulling and other infringements in the penalty box at corners, these offences would be considerably reduced, saving more time.

Ian Watson, Pitlochry.

Vintage humour

TO add to Robin Dow’s endorsement of wine, which cited Louis Pasteur and an Italian proverb (Letters, August 4), may I add: “I’d rather have a bottle in front of me, than a frontal lobotomy”, attributed to Dorothy Parker, American poet, writer, critic, satirist, and various others.

R Russell Smith, Largs.

• THE publication of my letter (August 2) on the subject of the effects of the substantial increase cost of wine has occasioned some responses. I was wondering whether or not a Portuguese contribution had been received from Mat Eus of that ilk?

Ian W Thomson, Lenzie.