DILI, 10 october 2022 (TATOLI) – The World Health Organization (WHO) has provided nearly US$11,000 to the Ministry of Health (MoH) for the celebration of World Mental Health Day in the Special Administrative Region of Oe-Cusse Ambeno (RAEOA), in Timor-Leste.
“The US$11,000 was given to support the celebration of the World Mental Health Day, which will be held in RAEOA, in the coming weeks,” Teofilo Tilman, the Head of the Mental Health Program, said in Dili, today.
Tilman informed that the government allocated about seven million for MoH’s Mental Health Program this year: “This is not enough.”
He emphasized that the celebration aims to raise mental health awareness among local authorities and health professionals to ensure equity in access to mental health care and services.
“We were supposed to celebrate the day today, but we postponed it because of some difficulties. We will celebrate the day in the coming weeks of this month,” Tilman added.
On the commemoration of World Mental Health Day, WHO called on the Member States in the South-East Asia Region, including Timor-Leste, to intensify action to achieve access for all to quality mental health care, in line with the recently adopted Paro Declaration on universal access to people-centered mental health care and services.
WHO Regional Director for South-East Asia, Dr. Poonam Khetrapal Singh said that in the South-East Asia Region, an estimated 1 in 7 people lived with a mental health condition, and in countries where data are available, the treatment gap ranged from 70-95%.
World Mental Health Day is celebrated on october 10, for global mental health education, awareness, and advocacy against social stigma.
The day was first celebrated in 1992 at the initiative of the World Federation for Mental Health, a global mental health organization with members and contacts in more than 150 countries.
Journalist: Filomeno Martins
Editor: Nelia Borges
