[Text on screen]: One in four people in the UK experiences mental health problems each year. According to NHS Digital, the number of people being sectioned has increased 47% in the last decade.

How human rights help those with mental health issues:

Human rights have been crucial in ensuring people with mental health issues are granted dignity and respect.

One pivotal case concerned a young woman who was discharged from hospital despite being judged to be “at high risk” of taking her own life. She hanged herself the next day.

The Supreme Court found the hospital had failed to protect her right to life. The case extended the duty of care hospitals have towards patients with mental illness.

In another case, the law changed after a man with schizophrenia was kept in hospital against his will even after his symptoms had reduced considerably.

The Supreme Court ruled that it was unreasonable to expect the patient to prove his own sanity and that the man had been deprived of his right to liberty which is protected by Article 5 of the Human Rights Convention.

In 2017, the government amended the UK’s disability benefit system, limiting the amount of support mental health sufferers received.

The High Court decided this breached people’s right not to be discriminated against as protected by the Human Rights Convention.

It also breached the rights of anyone with a disability to live in the community as protected by the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.

Around 220,000 mental health sufferers are expected to benefit from the ruling.

Human rights have done a lot for people who suffer with poor mental health. But more can be done to protect the rights of people with mental health problems.

We need to keep talking about mental health, to make the invisible visible. We need to keep fighting fir rights around mental health.

#RightsSaveLives