The Association of Psychiatrists in Nigeria has raised concerns over the state of the country’s mental health system, warning that widespread neglect, economic hardship, and structural barriers are worsening mental health conditions.
The association said this in a communiqué signed by its President, Prof Taiwo Obindo, and Secretary-General, Dr Olajide Abayomi, issued at the end of its 56th Annual General and Scientific Meeting in Benin City, themed “Nigeria Mental Health System: Gaps, Opportunities, and Prospects.”
The communiqué, made available to our correspondent on Saturday, noted that the association lamented that mental health remains severely underprioritised despite its growing burden.
The psychiatrists highlighted lack of access to care, high treatment costs, absence of insurance coverage, rising substance abuse among youths, and limited awareness as pressing threats to public health.
Recent findings by the World Health Organisation show that mental health conditions affect nearly 150 million people across Africa, yet care services remain severely under-resourced, fragmented, and largely inaccessible, especially in rural and underserved areas.
WHO warns that despite the widespread need, most African countries allocate less than $1 per person per year to mental health, resulting in a chronic shortage of trained professionals and limited infrastructure for prevention, treatment, and psychosocial support.
The psychiatrists said, “After extensive deliberations during the conference, some fundamental issues related to the theme and subthemes were raised, namely, neglect of mental health in Nigeria, despite the high prevalence of mental illness; barriers that obstruct access to care, which are structural and cultural, resulting in treatment gaps that leave affected individuals untreated; high cost of services, absence of health insurance coverage, and financial support for treatment.
“Other issues are the negative impact on mental well-being due to the economic difficulty faced in the last few years; profoundly wide gaps within the mental health systems in Nigeria, which provide the ground for opportunities and prospects; the presence of serious youth mental health problems, representing a significant public health and economic crisis; lack of awareness and high cost of accessing multidisciplinary health care services in Nigeria.
“Also, there is a rise in the abuse of psychoactive substances, particularly among the youth; and the big picture in substance use prevention and treatment in Nigeria, which encompasses people, organisations, policies, and the environment.”
The association called on the government to take urgent action to address mental health gaps, emphasising the need for improved access to care, social support systems, and policies that prioritise mental well-being.
It stated, “The government is to provide relational and community support, in terms of social, emotional, informational, and instrumental/practical supports to serve as buffers for the psychological impact of the economic downturn; further create structural and systemic factors, such as social safety nets, community-based services, and workplace support, to reduce the intensity of the economic stressors.
“The government is to expand access to evidence-based treatment, build a national research consortium, and foster community engagement and youth empowerment; summon political will, intersectoral collaboration, and a moral commitment to re-engineer the mental health system; and decentralise mental healthcare through primary care integration with a task-shifting, task-sharing model to enable non-specialist health workers to deliver basic mental health interventions at various levels.”
The association called for coordinated efforts across sectors to strengthen Nigeria’s mental health response.
It also called for collaboration and structured engagement with faith communities to promote mental health awareness and provide basic mental health training, noting their influence and accessibility.
“APN is to formalise a collaboration with, integration into, and social dialogue between them and the faith community to provide basic mental health training and promote mental health awareness, since they remain a trusted and influential source of accessing mental health care; develop a National Drug Law Enforcement Agency–APN joint training and capacity-building programme to tackle the drug menace.
“Mental health professionals should integrate psychotherapy into clinical practice and the academic training of trainees; be involved in MHPSS delivery in Nigeria; and shift their thinking from fixing individuals to fixing systems.
“All stakeholders are to strengthen rehabilitation, aftercare, and social reintegration; early prevention and school-based mental health programmes; reform educational curricula to be more skill-based and entrepreneurship-focused to reduce unemployment and underemployment; utilise the media (traditional and digital) and adopt digital technology (tele-psychiatry), which is acceptable to the youth,” it added.
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