by Kate Nightingale

For the thousands of people who have been working to raise awareness of mental health problems, and thousands upon thousands more who have felt unable to speak up about having one, today feels like a milestone moment. The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge and Prince Harry – loved and listened to the world over, icons with a global reach that’s almost unrivalled – are choosing to use the incredible platform they have to shine a spotlight on mental health.

When Mind and Rethink Mental Illness launched the Time to Change campaign to tackle mental health stigma in 2007, we talked about mental health as one of society’s last great taboos. A subject shrouded in shame and secrecy. The one in four people in England who experience mental illness each year had to endure widespread discrimination and stigma – on top of coping with their condition. When asked to describe the impact of this in our 2008 Stigma Shout survey, people told us that it led to isolation, to exclusion from everyday activities, to poor job prospects and a reluctance to seek help. The fear of stigma, and that it will unfairly harm one’s life chances, could be equally debilitating and for many, this combination of real and anticipated stigma was having a more negative impact than the illness itself. For some, it made them give up on life.

Since then, we’ve come a long way. The last few years have seen more and more people in the public eye – sportspeople and business leaders, actors and politicians – talking about their experiences more openly and in many ways this has made it easier for the rest of us to do the same. On Time to Talk Day each year we have generated millions more open conversations about mental health. We’ve reversed a downwards trend in public attitudes and improved the views of around three and a half million adults. The media, for the most part, has improved the way mental health is reported on – the Sun’s 2003 ‘Bonkers Bruno’ headline would hopefully not happen today. All this has led to those of us who have mental health problems being discriminated against less: our regular survey of people accessing specialist mental health services shows a significant reduction in reported discrimination in key life areas from 40% in 2008 to 26.3% in in 2014. Stigma – or the fear of it – is not holding so many of us back from work, school, love and life.

But there’s still a really long way to go until no one, when struggling with their mental health, thinking about seeking help or given a diagnosis whether it be depression, bipolar disorder, OCD or schizophrenia, needs to fear shame or judgement. 

We’ve recently been up and down the country researching what the public think about mental illness and despite the progress we’ve seen, this is still a subject which is widely misunderstood. People still trivialise and banter about mental health problems, not realising the real harm that this can cause to someone struggling, who’s left feeling unable to reach out for the support of their friends and family. Nine out of ten people with mental health problems still have to face some form of stigma or discrimination as a result.

That’s why this royal spotlight is so important and so welcome. Catherine, William and Harry have huge power to reach out to millions more people and say it’s OK to seek help for a mental health problem. With their support we can bring forward the day when this becomes accepted as an everyday and ordinary part of life.

Kate Nightingale is Head of Communications at Time to Change, England’s biggest campaign to end mental health stigma and discrimination run by Mind and Rethink Mental Illness.