LONDON (Reuters) – Depression is more damaging to everyday health than chronic diseases such as angina, arthritis, asthma and diabetes, researchers said on Friday.

And if people are ill with other conditions, depression makes them worse, the researchers found.

“We report the largest population-based worldwide study to our knowledge that explores the effect of depression in comparison with four other chronic diseases on health state,” the researchers wrote in the Lancet medical journal.

View the whole report at www.reuters.com.