Melinda Gates resigns from Gates Foundation

Ugh. I can't avoid reacting to this thinking that it would be great if people stopped trying to improve people's mental health, because so far the whole thing, all of it, has been a complete and total disaster.

Improving people's health is a good thing, when done right, but mental well-being is only a health issue when there is a biological reason for it, otherwise so far all efforts just end up doing more harm than good, to the point where the more is being done, the worse things get.

Until recently, mental health was ignored in medicine, depression was simply denied to exist and anxiety was character weakness. Any change in behavior was simply madness and to be treated with detainment, for the most part. And in recent decades there has been an opposite obsession with mental health this and that, and pretty much all it has to show for it is... a massive increase in mental illness. Most of which is an illusion caused by confusing poor health with mental health. But it remains that the more medical resources are dedicated to improving mental health, the worse things get.

Because for the most part, almost of all of what constitutes genuine mental health is socioeconomic, especially with safety regarding basic needs. The last few decades have even proven that awkwardly, by showing how getting people to take time off to do things they enjoy, people enjoy those things and feel a bit better. It has nothing to do with health, but since better socioeconomic circumstances improve both mental and physical health, this is a two-for-one. In fact if medicine were to get out of mental health entirely, instead call for basic socioeconomic safety nets and just stop the whole damn biopsychosocial nonsense, things would massively improve. For everyone, even doctors.

Seriously, stop improving people's mental health, it doesn't work.

 

I totally agree that "Unrest" would not be the film to recommend when advocating about ME/CFS. The whole time I watched the film it didn't sound like she was describing the same illness that I have or anyone else in this group. Just my opinion of course.