Mental health in Zambia

The most commonly diagnosed mental illness in Zambia is depression, alongside other neuropsychiatric disorders such as those relating to drug and alcohol abuse. The risk of mortality is significantly increased by the stigma attached to mental illness, the prevalence of HIV, high unemployment and socio-economic difficulties, with more than 68 per cent of individuals living on less than US$1 a day in 2010. Neuropsychiatric disorders contributed an estimated 4.1 per cent of the global burden of disease in 2008.