Austerity And Inequality Fueling Mental Illness, Says Top UN Envoy
Source: The Guardian
EXCLUSIVE: Special rapporteur on health says social justice more important for mental health than therapy and medication. Austerity, inequality and job insecurity are bad for mental health and governments should counteract them if they want to face up to the rising prevalence of mental illness, the UN's top health envoy has said.
In an exclusive interview with the Guardian to coincide with a hard-hitting report to be delivered to the UN in Geneva on Monday, Dr Dainius Pūras said measures to address inequality and discrimination would be far more effective in combatting mental illness than the emphasis over the past 30 years on medication and therapy.
"This would be the best 'vaccine' against mental illness and would be much better than the excessive use of psychotropic medication which is happening," said Pūras, who as the UN's special rapporteur on health reports back to the UN human rights council in Geneva.
He said that since the 2008 financial crisis, policies that accentuated division, inequality and social isolation have been bad for mental equilibrium. "Austerity measures did not contribute positively to good mental health," he said. "People feel insecure, they feel anxious, they do not enjoy good emotional wellbeing because of this insecurity situation." -MORE...
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/society/2019/jun/24/austerity-and-inequality-fuelling-mental-illness-says-top-un-envoy
There had been an overemphasis on trying to cure mental illness like physical illness, through "good medicine", Puras said without thinking about the social factors that cause or contribute to some mental disorders.
In the past 20 years, the prescription of psychotropic drugs to deal with mental illness, particularly antidepressants, has soared across the developed world.
_______________________________
'UN Expert Warns Inequality and Austerity Are Intensifying Global Mental Health Crisis.' Common Dreams, 6/24,/2019.
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2019/06/24/un-expert-warns-inequality-and-austerity-are-intensifying-global-mental-health
Pūrasa's interview with The Guardian came just before he delivered a major new report (pdf) on mental health to the U.N. General Assembly on Monday. While it does not single out any country in particular, the report slams as damaging to mental health "[c]uts to social welfare, laws, and policies that restrict access to sexual and reproductive health information, and services, the criminalization of drug possession or cultivation for personal use, laws that restrict civil society space, and corporal punishment of children and adults."
The report describes inequality as "a key obstacle to mental health globally" and states that action to curb inequities should be considered "a human rights issue." "Given the deep connections between inequality and poor health," the report says, "states are required to act on structural interventions far upstream, including in the political arrangements that allocate resources." "Reducing inequalities," the report continues, "is a precondition for promoting mental health and for reducing key risk factors, such as violence, disempowerment, and social exclusion."
= new reply since forum marked as read
