Culture

Morální naléhavost duševního zdraví

Nov 15, 2017 Michael Plant and Peter Singer

PRINCETON – Můžeme-li zabránit velkému utrpení, a přitom nás to nic nestojí, měli bychom to učinit. Tento princip je všeobecně uznávaný a těžko se rozporuje. Přesto západní vlády opomíjejí příležitost snížit obrovské utrpení způsobené duševními nemocemi, třebaže by se čisté náklady rovnaly nule.

Důkazy pro toto tvrzení pramení z nedávného výzkumu skupiny ekonomů z London School of Economics. Tým vedený Richardem Layardem vycházel z údajů ze čtyř významných rozvinutých zemí (Austrálie, Německa, Spojených států a Velké Británie), kde byli lidé požádáni, aby na stupnici 0-10 označili, do jaké míry jsou spokojeni se svým životem.

U osob, jejichž spokojenost se životem je na úrovni dolních 10% populace, hovoří vědci o „strádání“. Respondenti odpovídali také na další dotazy, které měly indikovat faktory ovlivňující jejich spokojenost se životem.

To continue reading, register now.

Subscribe now for unlimited access to everything PS has to offer.

As a registered user, you can enjoy more PS content every month – for free.

Already have an account? Log in

Introductory Offer: Save 30% on PS Digital

Subscribe now to gain greater access to Project Syndicate – including every commentary and our entire On Point suite of subscriber-exclusive content – starting at less than $5 per month.

Subscribe Now

Michael Plant

Writing for PS since 2017
3 Commentaries

Michael Plant is a post-doctoral research fellow at the Wellbeing Research Centre, Oxford, and Director of the Happier Lives Institute.

Peter Singer

Writing for PS since 2001
227 Commentaries

Peter Singer, Professor of Bioethics at Princeton University, is Founder of the nonprofit organization The Life You Can Save. His books include Animal Liberation, Practical Ethics, The Ethics of What We Eat (with Jim Mason), Rethinking Life and Death, The Point of View of the Universe, co-authored with Katarzyna de Lazari-Radek, The Most Good You Can Do, Famine, Affluence, and Morality, One World Now, Ethics in the Real World, Why Vegan?, and Utilitarianism: A Very Short Introduction, also with Katarzyna de Lazari-Radek. In April 2021, W.W. Norton published his new edition of Apuleius’s The Golden Ass. In 2013, he was named the world's third "most influential contemporary thinker" by the Gottlieb Duttweiler Institute. He is a co-author (with Shih Chao-Hwei) of the forthcoming The Buddhist and the Ethicist (Shambhala Publications, December 2023).

new comment has been posted. new comments have been posted.

0 Comments on this paragraph, 4 Comments on this article

lisalinettabircher Dec 15, 2017

I wonder if you considered research done by Kate Pickett and Richard Wilkinson on income inequality in rich societies related to various problems such as mental health problems, physical health problems and mortality, child wellbeing, drug abuse, violcene, trust etc : they are inversely correlated.
I'm very happy "internal happiness interventions" compared to classical "external happiness interventions" such as reducing poverty (without a doubt the later is essential and urgent in third world countries, whereas the first is essential in first world countries) is discussed by the EA community.
I'd like to add to the discussion (what was shown by the research mentioned) that many mental health problems don't come by chance and aren't destiny either - they are closely related to our social structure, and namely inequality. So instead of discussing better medication or other types of treatment, I suggest investing in research on ways of reducing inequality - which seems to be preventing not only mental health but all sorts of other problems causing people to be unhappy and lead miserable lives despite being relatively rich.

TED Talk on the topic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWpMr82jnf8
The book: The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better, 2009, by Kate Pickett and Richard Wilkinson
A new reply to this comment has been posted.
Will Haslett Nov 28, 2017

Isn't it worth nothing that these results may not hold up when considering the whole world, especially the developing world? Above a certain threshold income it's not hard to believe that mental health explains more variance in misery than does poverty, but there are 25 countries on the planet that have a Gross National Income per capita of less than $1,000 USD per year! What about them?
A new reply to this comment has been posted.
Yoshimichi Moriyama Nov 19, 2017

Harry Guntrip said somewhere in Healing the Sick Mind, "What psychotherapy is not is pep talk."
A new reply to this comment has been posted.
Dennis Mendelson Nov 15, 2017

Those seeking to improve public mental health may do well to focus on clinical thyroid practice.

Thyroid under-activity (hypothyroidism) is known to affect a few percent of the population, and the prevalence of disease may be underestimated. Subclinical conditions may put many at risk of chronically elevated cortisol, which can cause mental illness. [1][2][3]

Note that the hormonal threshold (of TSH, or thyroid stimulating hormone, which will generally rise in hypothyroidism) for elevated cortisol seems to be 2.0 uIU/L. [1] The British Thyroid Association says however: "There is no evidence to support the benefit of routine early treatment with thyroxine in non-pregnant patients with a serum TSH above the reference range (0.30 - 4.20mU/L) but <10mU/L. Physicians may wish to consider the suitability of a therapeutic trial of thyroxine on an individual patient basis" [4]

It may be true that there is “no evidence to support the benefit of routine early treatment with thyroxine”, however it’s a low-risk intervention that should be trialled when mental illness is accompanied by biochemical indications. This could improve the quality of life of perhaps millions.

Note: uIU/L is equivalent to mU/L

[1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3520819/
[2] ttps://thyroidresearchjournal.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1756-6614-3-11
[3] http://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/2006/04/stress-mood.aspx
[4] http://www.btf-thyroid.org/images/documents/tft_guideline_final_version_july_2006.pdf
A new reply to this comment has been posted.