CAMH’s contributes to World Mental Health Day: Oct. 10, 2009

Participants and faculty (Joanna Henderson, third from right, back row; Dale Kuehl, second from right, back row; and Jaime Sapag, front row, centre) in a four-day Addiction Capacity Building Program in Aracaju, Brazil, July 6-10, 2009.

To commemorate World Mental Health Day (WMH) CAMH is hosting a one day symposium -- ‘ Mental Illness and Addiction Stigma and Discrimination: Addressing the Global and Local Challenges in Primary Care Settings ’—that will focus on the barriers to effective care posed by stigma and alternative options for meeting the challenge at the primary care level.

October 10^th was designated World Mental Health Day in 1992 by the World Federation of Mental Health (WFMH) and remains the only annual worldwide global public awareness and education campaign to promote public understanding of mental health. This year’s theme, ‘ Mental Health in Primary Care: Enhancing Treatment and Promoting Mental Health' has great relevance for CAMH as primary care capacity building has become a cornerstone of its international and local efforts to strengthen addiction and mental health care.

Participants and faculty of the School Based Mental Health Promotion training for Sri Lanka take part in the closing seminar event at Chennai, India, August, 2008.

This year will be a particularly special one for CAMH’s Office of International Health as it collaborates with partners around the world on several related events:

1) October 5: in Aracaju, Brazil (jointly with the State of Sergipe)

2) October 8: in Mexico City, Mexico (jointly with the National Institute of Psychiatry Ramon de la Fuente)

3) October 9: in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (jointly with the Ministry of Health and Social Welfare)

4) November 10: Lima, Peru (jointly with the Universidad Nacional Cayetano Heredia, Universidad Central del Ecuador y Universidad Catolica de Chile)

5) November 16: Leon, Nicaragua (jointly with the Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Nicaragua-Leon

These collaborations grow out of shared commitments to strengthen addiction and mental health within primary care. CAMH and its key partners recognize that most individuals, families and communities access mental health and addiction care through primary care. Our joint capacity building efforts are aimed at ensuring that primary health care (PHC) provides care that is comprehensive and effective, including health promotion, early recognition, diagnosis, treatment and rehabilitation, as well as referrals to other community based agencies or to secondary or tertiary level services.


Participants and faculty of a two-week Mental Health and Addiction Capacity Building Program in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, 2009.		The Office of International Health team (l-r): Jaime Sapag, Sirad Mohamoud, Akwatu Khenti and Katherine Lo.