During the 80th Session of the United Nations General Assembly High-Level Week, I was honoured to attend No Health Without Mental Health: A Shared Commitment, convened by the World Health Organization, the Wellcome Trust, and United for Global Mental Health, in collaboration with UNICEF and the Governments of France and Antigua & Barbuda.

I was pleased to confer with my brother, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of World Health Organization, and H.E. Dr. Jean Kaseya, Director General at Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, and to hear the powerful testimony of Her Excellency Olena Zelenska, First Lady of Ukraine, as we gathered to affirm a principle of profound global importance, that there can be no health without mental health.

As mental health assumes its rightful place within the global health agenda, I was particularly delighted to see the Nigeria Mental Health Desk Team, led by Dr Tunde Massey-Ferguson Ojo, National Coordinator of Nigeria’s National Mental Health Programme at the Federal Ministry of Health, Nigeria, with whom my Wellbeing Foundation Africa had convened a Ministerial Roundtable to launch the National Mental Health Policy.

I commend the convening partners for their leadership, particularly in my role as the Honorary Patron of LifeLine International and reaffirm my and the Wellbeing Foundation Africa’s own commitment to ensuring that mental health remains at the core of our pursuit of universal health and wellbeing.

 

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