World Mental Health Day 2024

It's World Mental Health Day 2024, a chance to remember there are solutions to the youth mental health crisis and a call to action for all of us.

This year’s World Mental Health theme, 'Mental Health at Work', considers how initiatives like vocational recovery can make a real difference.

IAYMH leaders Professor Patrick McGorry, Professor Eóin Killackey, Professor Srividya Iyer and Professor Barbara Dooley co-contributed to the recently released Lancet Psychiatry Commission on youth mental health. A policy briefing summarising the key recommendations is also available.

This definitive analysis of the worldwide state of youth mental health highlighted that the proportion of young people not in employment, education, and training is substantially higher in young people with mental ill health than in those without, reflecting a circular problem.

The good news is that with mental ill-health commonly emerging between ages 12 to 25, research shows that when we intervene early, we can break this cycle and help young people recover from mental ill-health. As a society we urgently need to do more to ensure the right systems are in place to support the long-term health, wellbeing and productivity of the next generation.

“The worsening global youth mental health crisis provides an unprecedented opportunity for societies and communities around the world to dramatically improve quality of life and life expectancy for their people and to improve social cohesion and economic productivity.

These outcomes can be achieved through a combination of reversing harmful social and economic policies, investing strongly in prevention and mental health research, and giving top priority to the mental health of young people within innovative systems of integrated health and social care.” - Professor Patrick McGorry.

More info about this year's theme and a range of resources are also available on the World Health Organisation's website.

ADVOCATING AND COLLABORATING FOR THE MENTAL HEALTH NEEDS OF YOUNG PEOPLE AROUND THE WORLD