Mental illness cases in India to increase by 23 percent by 2025
Posted on: 24/May/2016 9:37:18 AM
A study published in the journal Lancet has said that the burden of mental illness is likely to increase by 23 per cent in India by 2025. According to estimated data, around 3801 million people will be affected in India by mental illness by 2025. This is a 23 percent increase from the report released in 2013. The study was conducted by doctors and researchers at the Public health Foundation of India.
A senior doctor at the Foundation said, In layman`s terms it (healthy life years lost) reflects the disability caused by mental, neurological and substance abuse disorders. On their own, such disorders cannot lead to direct mortality, however, it leads to premature mortality and a loss of healthy, fully-functioning life. A person living with MNS disorder does not lead a full, healthy life and the measure of that is YLD (Years Lived with Disability) and YLL (Years of Life Lost). While India has progressive policies regarding mental health care, the actual implementation of comprehensive community oriented services is patchy and the treatment gaps, especially in rural areas, are very large. The overall population growth in India explains a greater proportion of the increase in mental, neurological, and substance use disorder burden from 1990 to 2013 (44 per cent) than in China (20 per cent). However, as we were unable to incorporate changes in prevalence of mental, neurological, and substance use disorders between 1990 and 2013 in our projections through to 2025, the final projections are ab underestimation.
