Happy Friday Friends,
May is Mental Health Awareness Month in the US, and it always skips my mind because I am used to October being Mental Health Month.
Also I am not that active in frontline advocacy anymore, taking this self-care period very seriously, so I miss out on a lot. In the spirit of mental health awareness, I would like to share a throwback piece from an online session with Debating Africa (2 minutes 30 secs long).
In the video, I talk about the need to have tailor-made mental health solutions that align with local cultures, specific realities, and the unique challenges faced across the continent. I mention that this starts with having our own data, and doing our own research, to get a proper baseline of our mental health situation.
I also emphasize that the quest to create solutions should not look at mental health as a stand-alone issue, but should also consider systemic challenges, as well as how mental health outcomes interconnect with broader development goals in Africa.
We had this conversation in 2021 when every other meeting was COVID inclined. Four years later, the same principles remain, only shift is that we are AI leaning (or is it immersed) now.
A reframe to the question, and what I actually answer, is: How can mental health treatment be a priority in Africa?
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