Forms of stigma and discrimination against people with experience of mental ill health are global and may have severe consequences in terms of social exclusion. Important forms of social injustice such as barriers to healthcare, premature mortality and unemployment can all be related in part to stigma.
Evidence is now clear from high-income countries, and is emerging from low- and middle-income countries that effective interventions can be delivered to reduce such stigma and discrimination.
The time is right for a detailed reappraisal of this field and for a set of practical and radical recommendations to guide action at international, national and local levels, intended to eradicate mental health related stigma and discrimination for good.
The newly established Lancet Commission on stigma and discrimination in mental health (LCS), led by the Commission Co-Chairs Charlene Sunkel, Founder/CEO of the Global Mental Health Peer Network (Johannesburg, South Africa) and Sir Graham Thornicroft, Community Psychiatrist and Professor at King’s College London (London, UK), brings together experts, including experts by experience, from different backgrounds around the world to examine current definitions and impacts of stigma and discrimination, to identify policies, resources, interventions and initiatives which are contextually and culturally relevant and effective to eradicate mental health related stigma and discrimination.
The Lancet Commission on stigma and discrimination in mental health was announced on Nov 5th 2020 in a Comment published in The Lancet, available here. The report will be launched on Oct 10th 2022.
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Image above by Tim Mossholder on Unsplash