Reflecting on 2021: Highlights from our year so far

In January 2021 we helped see the launch of The Global Business Collaboration for Better Workplace Mental Health – the first business-led global collaboration of its kind focused on advocating and accelerating progress in workplace mental health. The initiative was incubated by UnitedGMH with a range of private sector partners, and we also host the secretariat.

Together with academic experts, multilateral institutions, and not-for-profit organisations, the Collaboration aims to create a world where all workplace leaders commit to taking tangible action, enabling their workforce to thrive. It is encouraging all employers to pledge to improve workplace mental health.

April marked one year since the launch of our #MHForAll webinar series. Launched in April 2020 in collaboration with The Lancet Psychiatry, Mental Health Innovation Network, MHPSS.net, the series was initially a way to provide policy makers and the wider health community with the latest evidence on the mental health impact of COVID-19.

Since then the series has continued to grow, reaching above and beyond its initial scope. We have now run almost 40 sessions,  and expanded the series’ focus to explore a range of critical intersectionalities in the field of global mental health. More than 150 speakers have taken part, including governments, UN agencies, international and national civil society organisations, researchers, campaigners and people with lived experience. The series restarts on September 28th, and we will be in touch in the coming weeks with further information on how you can sign up.

Earlier this year, 387 signatories from 75 countries united behind our call for the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria to integrate mental health into health systems.

The Open Letter to the Fund’s Strategy Committee outlined how building in explicit funding for mental health services and psychosocial support at every stage of the HIV and TB service continuum as part of quality person-centred care, will help to lay the foundations of rights-based, quality universal mental health coverage, and accelerate progress against these epidemics.

In May we were proud to join a coalition of more than 1000 organizations, brands, government agencies and cultural leaders for the world’s first-ever Mental Health Action Day.

During the internationally recognised Mental Health Awareness Month, MTV Entertainment Group spearheaded an open-source movement to shift culture from awareness to tangible action on mental health. With prominent supporters including CBS, NAACP, Nickelodeon, Selena Gomez & Rare Beauty, TikTok, World Health Organization (WHO) and YMCA, it was a pleasure to be part of the largest cross-sector effort to move the dial on mental health and emotional wellbeing.

Three years since we launched GMHAN to help build collaboration on mental health advocacy, communications and financing, we have reached a membership of over 1300 from more than 100 countries. This is thanks to a combination of different efforts and activities to virtually build a community through multiple webinars, meetings and the formation of four working groups (covering children and youth, financing, suicide prevention and communications).

On 2nd and 3rd June, the Network also hosted its Annual Meeting – a key opportunity for network members to engage with one another, learn from others and inspire advocacy for the coming year. With experts including lived experience advocates from around the world, the meeting included a fantastic lineup of speakers for its ten virtual events, including Devora Kestel, Director of Mental Health and Substance Use at WHO.

To mark the first day of the High Level Meeting on AIDS in June, we launched groundbreaking research at our side event in collaboration with Frontline AIDS – research commissioned by United for Global Mental Health, supported by the Elton John AIDS Foundation, and conducted by Dr José Manuel Roche.

With our latest research we can now confirm integrating basic mental health and psychosocial services into HIV and TB programmes will not only help millions of vulnerable people, but will end these co-epidemics at a faster rate, and in a cost-effective way.

This year the ministerial summit on mental health, hosted by the French government, is focused on rights. The theme for World Mental Health Day is “mental health in an unequal world.” And already, WHO has launched the next phase of its work on Quality Rights with practical examples of how to advance a rights-based approach to mental health. Meanwhile at national and regional level, rights campaigners (including our Speak Your Mind partners) have been working to reform policies and practice in areas including access to services and the end to coercive treatment.

In the coming months and years we will continue to focus our work on the areas in which we have built unique knowledge and expertise. We look forward to continuing our work to step up progress on global mental health, and we remain committed to our vision for a world where everyone, everywhere has someone to turn to for support.