toothache I woke up one day with this
sharp stabbing pain around my tooth Bert
the day I got worse and worse until it
felt like millions of hot burning
needles being pushed into my flesh
underneath my tooth I couldn’t sleep I
couldn’t eat I couldn’t think although
was was pain so the next morning I told
my parents and they took me by the hand
and they drove me to the dentist I
didn’t have an appointment so I had to
wait for hours but I remember these
hours felt like an eternity to me when I
was finding my turn to see the dentist
it was horrible there was drilling that
was cleaning that was crying but after a
few days the pain was gone so this is
how I grew up
I grew up with the understanding of
living in a world where this is how it
works when you’re in pain you tell your
loved ones they hold you by the hand you
go see a doctor and you get helped
growing older I found out that this is
not always how it goes couple of years
ago I had a friend who was one might say
in a similar situation to the one that I
was in back when I was little she was in
severe pain my friend did not suffer
from a tooth ache though my friend was
suffering from a depression what this
means is that her pain was not limited
to her tooth but it was also in her legs
and in her stomach and in her head it
was sitting on her chest and inside her
heart the millions of thought burning
needles
I felt so strongly back when I was
little they were everywhere to her just
like me she couldn’t eat she couldn’t
sleep she couldn’t think although was
was pain yet when my friend called for
help no one took her by the hand and
when she went to see a doctor she was
sent away she went from Doctor to doctor
to doctor and from waiting list to
waiting list to waiting list and in the
end it took her five months before she
got a care thinking back to the hours
that I had to wait at the dentist I
cannot imagine what five months would
have done to me and since then I kept
asking myself why what was the
difference in the situation that I was
in compared to the situation that my
friend was in we were both in pain we
both needed help why did I with the pain
of a toothache receive felt Woltz my
friend who were suffering from something
just as real and just as painful though
maybe not as visible was neglected by
the healthcare system and I tell you
something and this is scary part now my
friend she’s not the exception
she’s the rule it is across the world
and so-called developed countries that
people with mental health disorders like
a depression like an anxiety are being
neglected by health care systems my old
view of a world where if you need help
you receive help was wrong instead we
are living in a world where if you have
a broken arm or tooth ache on open wound
you have people holding your hands and
you get help straight away whilst when
you suffer from the severe agony of a
depression of an anxiety people run away
from you and you wait months before you
receive care and I’m here to say today
that I do not understand and that I
definitely do not approve there’s 600
million people out there in this world
who suffer from
depression of an anxiety which is almost
a tenth of the population and the number
keeps rising and still mental illness
remains in the shadow so I’m asking what
do you people need to take mental
illness seriously what do you need to
finally treat depression as a proper
illness do you need some sort of
physical effects because look at an fMRI
scan of a person with depression you
will see that there is changes to the
brain of a person with depression and
that there’s loads of physical symptoms
being associated with it like back pain
like an in pain like joint pain or do
you need financial impacts because then
I tell you that the lack of treatment of
depression and anxiety costs the global
economy one trillion dollars each year
which is just as much as cancer costs us
or do you need deadly consequences
because then I tell you that more people
die because they kill themselves due to
depression then they die because of
homicide or because of car accidents it
is now the second leading cause of death
in the United States among the youth and
in fact since I’ve started giving this
talk about 15 people somewhere around
this world will have taken their own
lives due to an untreated depression so
I say it’s time to change it’s time to
change the way we think about mental
illness it’s time to change the way we
treat mental illness there’s so many new
possibilities nowadays there’s so many
new treatment options why do we not take
advantage one example is technology I
studied psychology at the University of
Cambridge where I learned there’s so
many new ways in which technology can
help to provide better care to people so
this year we founded our own company
called self appeal with which we provide
online psychotherapy to people with
depression with Barnard and with anxiety
disorders our psychologists they work
around the clock so that people who need
help can actually get helped with the
24 hours what we do is we developed
online courses with which we teach the
patients the strategies of cognitive
behavioral therapy so eventually they
will be able to help themselves because
they know the techniques our
psychologists also speak to them on the
phone
weekly so they have someone to speak to
and talk about their problems and we’re
creating a community where people can
learn to support each other where people
can speak to each other where people
know that there’s others out there who
feel just like them where people know
that it’s okay not always to be ok since
we started we had thousands of people
signing up and I think that this is
great and I’m happy about it but here’s
what I also want to say it also makes me
sad it makes me sad that so many people
have to come to us because they’re not
given help by the traditional healthcare
system it makes me sad that so many
people have to come to us because
they’re on the 10th waiting list because
the insurance doesn’t cover the costs
because they’ve only been medicated for
years and now finally need someone to
talk to because they cannot go to your
doctor because they’re too afraid of
what others might think about them it
makes me sad that so many of them are
under 18 and it makes me sad that so
many of them have the concrete plans to
take their own lives because this tells
me that it is real but the stigma is
real that the intolerance is real that
the shame is real and that treatment
options are appalling still I do believe
that there is hope with self appeal with
our online psychotherapy we’re now in
the process of integrating our service
with general practitioners with sulphur
groups and with insurances and I see
that things like that are happening
somewhere around the world in course
Europe so I say that there is hope but
also that so much more needs to change
because it’s not enough something
fundamental
needs to change and people’s heads so
that we do take mental illness seriously
so that we treat depression as a proper
illness so I’m calling out for more
psychotherapists I’m calling out for
shorter waiting times I’m calling out
for less pure medication treatment I’m
calling out for insurances to cover
costs and calling out for more people to
hold each other’s hands and to the
politicians who sit there deciding who
gets treatment and who doesn’t make
mental health a policy priority treat
depression as a proper illness give it
the attention that it needs to have
thank
[Applause]
you [Music]