Advocating for mental health financing at the Spring Meetings

With the Spring Meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank Group (Spring Meetings) fast approaching, the secretariat and finance working group members of the Global Mental Health Action Network have been working to ensure mental health takes a leading role on the global stage. 

The meetings are a key advocacy opportunity in international development. Bringing together central bankers, ministers of finance and development, private sector executives, civil society, media and academics, they pose a unique opportunity to ensure that financial leaders, heads of state and private sector executives give mental health the attention it requires. 

With this year’s theme focusing on From Crisis to Resilience: Helping countries build a green and resilient recovery, the Network’s secretariat has produced a briefing to explain the opportunity at hand, as well as compiling the Network’s activities around this global moment.

Read the full briefing here

In addition to this, members of the Network’s Financing Mental Health Working Group have produced a policy paper making the case for governments, and specifically finance ministries, to invest in mental health. 

The working group hopes that the paper will provide a guide in how to approach mental health financing discussions with governments, both in the context of the IMF and World Bank Spring Meetings, and more generally. It also includes key recommendations for finance ministries and financing institutions, as well as a full breakdown of the issue, and the opportunity that properly financing mental health can pose. 

Read the full policy paper here

In addition to this, the Global Mental Health Action Network’s Financing Mental Health Working Group has developed a guide to urging Ministries to invest in Mental Health.

Read the guide