The Scottish solution: 'Look good but feel crap?'

From today's edition of The Globe and Mail:

Scotland has become a leader in tackling mental illness, thanks to innovative legislation and high-profile public-awareness campaigns. The suicide-prevention effort features everyone from football teams to the pop duo the Proclaimers.

To read the entire article, click here.

Eleanor Trebilcock of Arbroath, Scotland, with her dog Jake. After suffering with depression, Ms. Trebilcock became a product of the country’s old thinking about mental illness, but she’s also benefited from its new approach. 'The stigma,' she said, 'is slowly disappearing.' (Randy Quan for The Globe and Mail)

BY THE NUMBERS

25 to 33 - Percentage of Scottish people experiencing mild to moderate mental-health problems, out of a population of five million 3 Percentage of the population with severe and enduring mental illness

1 - Ranking of suicide as the cause of death for Scots under 35 years old

765 - Number of suicides in Scotland in 2006

13 - Percentage decline in the suicide rate since 2002

20 - Percentage drop that Scotland wants to see in the suicide rate by 2013 (from the base year 2002)

Also see: The branding that devalues.