Salzburg Global Fellows Call for Renewed Global Commitment to Mental Health

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Jan 29, 2015
by Salzburg Global Seminar
Salzburg Global Fellows Call for Renewed Global Commitment to Mental Health

Fellows of Salzburg Global session New Paradigms for Behavioral and Mental Health issue their Salzburg Statement

Fellows of the Salzburg Global session New Paradigms for Behavioral and Mental Health have called on the United Nation to make a "renewed global commitment to mental health."

During the Salzburg Global program, it was recognized that the United Nations post-2015 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) have a critical part to play in setting priorities for the development and investment in healthcare systems, prompting the 70 international healthcare policy experts, practitioners and service users, who attended the December 2014 session, to collectively draft their Salzburg Statement

The Statement calls on the UN and its Member States to make a "renewed global commitment to mental health, with clear and specific targets and indicators, particularly with a focus on mental health treatment coverage, strengthening community health, outreach and peer support."

Upon the issuing of the Statement, Salzburg Global Fellow and professor of community psychiatry at the Institute of Psychiatry, King’s College London, Graham Thornicroft said: "As mental health problems contribute so much towards disability and mortality worldwide, it is right that the United Nations fully recognises this by agreeing strong mental health targets and indicators in the new Sustainable Development Goals."

Paul Burstow, Salzburg Global Fellow, UK Member of Parliament and author of the UK government’s mental health strategy added: "Now is the time for the United Nations to fully reflect the impact of mental health problems worldwide by agreeing to clear and challenging mental health targets and indicators in the new Sustainable Development Goals."

The Statement is now being shared with policy-makers and practitioners around the world. 

You can read the statement in full below.


Salzburg Global Statement on
New Paradigms for Behavioral and Mental Health Care

Recommendations of Salzburg Global Fellows

 

We, the participants of the Salzburg Global session New Paradigms for Behavioral and Mental Health Care (listed below):

I. Recognize the central importance of mental health in the United Nations post-2015 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs);

II. Accept the case for fully including mental health in the SDGs given:

  1. The global prevalence of mental disorders and psychosocial disabilities, with 1 in 4 people experiencing mental health problems in their lifetime;
  2. The excessive treatment gap in low- and middle-income countries, where often over 90% of people with mental disorders receive no effective treatment;
  3. The global under-financing of the mental health sector, and the critical shortage of mental health services;
  4. The breach of the universal right to health for up to 600 million people with mental illness across the world each year;
  5. The growing global impact of mental disorders and psychosocial disabilities, which contribute 23% of the total global burden of disease;
  6. The often long-lasting disability caused by mental disorders and psychosocial disabilities, and the high impact of the excess mortality, and suicide;
  7. The global crisis, of human rights violations, social exclusion, stigma and discrimination of persons with mental disorders and psychosocial disabilities; 

III. Accept the importance of fully including mental health in the SDG targets and indicators, which will be necessary to provide reliable information, and measurable and comparable data, for policy makers, service providers, and service users, to enhance mental health systems and services worldwide;

IV. Regret that, despite growing global awareness, until now there has been a lack of substantial progress in fully including mental health in the United Nations SDGs.

We therefore call upon the United Nations, and its Member States, for a renewed global commitment to mental health, with clear and specific targets and indicators, particularly with a focus on mental health treatment coverage, strengthening community health, outreach and peer support.


Download the Salzburg Statement as a PDF


Signatories: Alvaro Aravena Molina, Community Mental Health Center Rinconada, Chile; Alvaro Arenas Borrero, Clinica La Inmaculada, Colombia; Ilirjana Bajraktari, Kosovo; Peter Bartlett, University of Nottingham, UK; Paulina Bravo, Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile, Chile; Paul Burstow, House of Parliament, UK; July Caballero, Peruvian National Institute of Mental Health, Peru; Dawn Carey, Dartmouth Center for Health Care Delivery Science, USA; Joshua Chauvin, Canada; R. Chellamuthu, M.S.Chellamuthu Trust and Research Foundation, India; Trina Dutta, USA; Byron Good, Harvard University, USA; Shpend Haxhibeqiri, University Clinical Centre of Kosovo, Kosovo; Jonida Haxhiu, Institute of Public Health of Albania, Albania; Prince Bosco Kanani, Rwanda NGO’s Forum on AIDS and Health Promotion, Rwanda; Gloria King, Rainbow Healing, USA; Bernadette Klapper, Germany; John Lotherington, Salzburg Global Seminar, UK; Hafsa Lukwata, Ministry of Health, Uganda; Marie-Josee Maliboli, Rwanda Biomedical Center, Rwanda; Lisa Marsch, Dartmouth Center for Health Care Delivery Science, USA; Maria Elena Medina Mora, National Institute on Psychiatry Ramon de la Fuente Muniz, Mexico; Susan Mende, USA; Nancy Misago, Rwanda Biomedical Center / Ministry of Health, Rwanda, Martha Mitrani Gonzales, National Institute of Mental Health HD-HN, Peru; Anna Moore, UCL Partners, UK; Albert Mulley, Dartmouth Center for Health Care Delivery Science, USA; Gloria Nieto De Cano, Asociacion Colombiana Personas con Esquizofrenia y Familias, Colombia; Angela Ofori-Atta, University of Ghana School of Medicine & Dentistry, Ghana; Sally Okun, PatientsLikeMe, USA; Emmanuel Owusu Ansah, The Ministry of Health of Ghana, Ghana; Merritt Patridge, Dartmouth Center for Health Care Delivery Science, USA; Thara Rangaswamy, Schizophrenia Research Foundation (SCARF), India; Veronique Roger, USA; Rodrigo Salinas, Universidad de Chile, Chile; Ronald Stock, USA; Ezra Susser, Columbia University, USA; Graham Thornicroft, Kings College London, UK; Chris Underhill, BasicNeeds UK, UK; Jose Miguel Uribe, Colombia; Dale Walker, Oregon Health & Science University, USA; Peter Yaro, BasicNeeds Ghana, Ghana; Cynthia Zavala, Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile, Chile; Ericka Zimmerman, University of Charleston, USA