Health Equity: 10/05/12

Friday, October 5, 2012

[EQ] Depression A Global Public Health Concern - World Mental Health Day - 10 October 2012

World Mental Health Day - 10 October 2012

World Mental Health Day raises public awareness about mental health issues. The day promotes open discussion of mental disorders, and investments in prevention, promotion and treatment services. This year the theme for the day is “Depression: A Global Crisis”.

Depression affects more than 350 million people of all ages, in all communities, and is a significant contributor to the global burden of disease. Although there are known effective treatments for depression, access to treatment is a problem in most countries and in some countries fewer than 10% of those who need it receive such treatment….

Depression A Global Public Health Concern

Developed by Marina Marcus, M. Taghi Yasamy, Mark van Ommeren, and Dan Chisholm, Shekhar Saxena

WHO Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse – http://bit.ly/T5tK7J

“……Depression is a significant contributor to the global burden of disease and affects people in all communities across the world. Today, depression is estimated to affect 350 million people. The World Mental Health Survey conducted in 17 countries found that on average about 1 in 20 people reported having an episode of depression in the previous year.

Depressive disorders often start at a young age; they reduce people’s functioning and often are recurring. For these reasons, depression is the leading cause of disability worldwide in terms of total years lost due to disability. The demand for curbing depression and other mental health conditions is on the rise globally….”

Related links

Public health action for the prevention of suicide
WHO, 2012 http://bit.ly/UIPIPs

WHO World Mental Health Day 2012 Fact sheet: http://bit.ly/QORmOb

The World Federation for Mental Health WFMH– Website: http://bit.ly/QXBRHd

WHO Mental Health Gap Action Programme, mhGAP http://bit.ly/QXCy2Z

WHO Resolution WHA65.4
“The global burden of mental disorders and the need for a comprehensive, coordinated response from health and social sectors at the country level” http://bit.ly/R3lkOO

KMC/2012/SDE
Twitter http://twitter.com/eqpaho

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[EQ] Promoting Active Transportation: An Opportunity for Public Health

Promoting Active Transportation: An Opportunity for Public Health

The American Public Health Association APHA – 2012
The Safe Routes to School National Partnership
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention through funding from the Healthy Community Design Initiative within the National Center for Environmental Health.

Available online at: http://bit.ly/VqiFUM

“…….Everyone travels. Whether it is for work, school or play, how we as individuals and as a society travel has impacts that go far beyond the seemingly simple and routine act of going from one place to another.

This common trait provides an ideal intervention point for public health practitioners. In fact, it may be one of the few intervention points with the potential to transform individual health, community health and environmental conditions all at the same time. In other words, in a time of tight budgets, limited resources, declining workforce numbers and growing health problems, creating opportunities for safe bicycling and walking can literally provide public health practitioners with one of the biggest bangs for their already-stretched buck…..”

“……Creating healthy communities and a good quality of life for people is a central tenet of public health work. Promoting health in transportation is an upstream public health intervention and can benefit health, the environment and the economy in many ways. Who better to promote health in transportation planning and decision-making than public health practitioners?

Here are suggested ways that public health practitioners can and have made an impact….”

Thank you.