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The WHO wants to redesign mental health care globally. Ahead of World Mental Health Day, the WHO released a new guide urging countries to shift from long-term institutional psychiatric care to community-based, person-centred models. Nearly half of people in psychiatric facilities are held involuntarily — sometimes for decades — and only 9% of countries have fully made the transition.
The World Health Organization (WHO) released a new guide ahead of World Mental Health Day, pushing countries to move away from long-term psychiatric hospitalization and toward community-based, rights-respecting mental health care. The process — called deinstitutionalization (DI) — focuses on helping people who've spent six months or more in psychiatric facilities return to community life with the housing, healthcare, and social support they need to thrive.
The guide lays out practical steps for psychiatric hospital leaders, including reducing long-stay admissions, reforming institutional practices, and building community support systems. Crucially, it emphasizes that people with lived experience of institutional care must be active partners in shaping these reforms — not just passive recipients of them.
By the Numbers:
Why it matters: Millions of people worldwide are living in psychiatric institutions, often with limited autonomy for years or even decades. This WHO guide signals a global push to redesign mental health systems around dignity, choice, and community — a shift that could reshape how countries fund, build, and deliver mental health care.
