The new Marmot Report on health inequalities is published today, a decade after his first landmark report.
Centre for Mental Health chief executive Sarah Hughes said: “There is compelling evidence that mental health inequalities are inextricable from other health inequalities. For many people and communities they are the bridge between wider economic and social disadvantages and poorer physical health.
“Unless mental health inequalities, and the forces that drive them, are made a priority by government, we will never make progress in tackling other health inequalities. This means addressing child poverty, racism, violence, misogyny, homophobia and discrimination of all kinds. It means looking again at how the benefits system works, how education is structured, how the labour market works, and how some people’s voices are silenced or ignored again and again.”
Later this year, Centre for Mental Health will conclude the Commission for Equality in Mental Health, a two-year investigation into what causes inequalities in mental health and how they can be tackled.
Commission for Equality in Mental Health chair Liz Sayce said: “For too long, inequality has been treated as incidental to mental health policies and services. This has pushed too many people to the margins. The second Marmot Report must be a wake-up call to policymakers nationwide that equality needs to be at the heart of health policy and that health must be at the centre of all government policies.”
