Ever wondered what the most burdensome disease is in the world today? According to the World Health Organization, the disease that robs the most adults of the most years of productive life is not AIDS, not heart disease, not cancer. It is depression. As with many conditions, mental health is widely misunderstood.
When was the last time you said these three words? All of us need some support during our lives here. Help is sometimes practical – like moving furniture or carrying grocery-bags. At other times, all you want is a hug, or some emotional support. Although it’s normal to need and ask for support, many of us can find it hard to do so: especially when it comes to our mental health.
In 2020, the South African Depression and Anxiety Group (SADAG) received well over three hundred thousand calls asking for help and support – that’s more than three times the capacity of the FNB stadium.
When you want to improve your health, you focus on the basics: eat better and exercise more. But here is something else to consider: your social life. Not how often you go out, but the way relationships and friendships impact your overall health.
Often there is confusion about what mental health means. Many people immediately start thinking about severe conditions like chronic depression and personality disorders – but there are other factors that create feelings of anxiety and worry, that may impact our...
We live in a switched-on world in which it’s almost unthinkable to be without social media for so much as a day. According to Statista, a company specialising in market and consumer data, around 30 million South Africans were on social networking sites in 2019. What’s more, this number is set to grow to close to 50 million by 2026!
There’s no two ways about it: being bullied isn’t just tough in the moment, it continues to take a toll in other areas of your life. Bullying leaves a trail of destruction in its wake. It shatters your self-esteem and increases your risk of anxiety, depression, sleep disturbance and self-harm. It can even result in physical health problems like high blood pressure, stomach pain and poor appetite.
It’s something that has puzzled researchers from the start of the pandemic – why do some people experience severe illness, and others do not? These differences extend beyond known risk factors – like age, and existing disease. To answer this question, researchers began studying the genetics of people exposed to the SARS-CoV-2 virus and were able to identify links between developing the disease and variations in specific parts of their DNA.
The pandemic has highlighted the idea of a disease being front and center in all aspects of our lives. However, for someone living with a chronic condition, this has been their reality long before COVID-19 came along, and the pandemic has simply made things worse. Economic, social and psychological distress is common amongst those living with chronic conditions, such as tuberculosis (TB).
Underlying all human rights is a deep respect for human life. There are those passionate people whose daily lives center around defending and upholding these precious rights so that we can all live in a more caring and just world. Each one of us can take inspiration from this and make choices that demonstrate how our own personal values uphold human rights.
