Mental Health Month: Why is it Necessary?

Vinícius Aguiar Angeloni

The complicated pandemic that our society went through took a major toll on basically all areas of our lives. For a majority of people, their social and emotional stabilities were the ones that got the most affected, considering that many weren’t allowed to leave their homes and even less see their friends and family. Taking this into consideration in these post pandemic times, we should take a moment to comprehend the importance of taking mental health seriously and why it’s important for all of us to support and promote the month of May, the mental health awareness month.

The date was formed in 1949 when the group Mental Health America alongside other associations determined that the month of May, in the United States, would be labeled as the mental health month in order to spread awareness about the importance of acknowledging your own mental and emotional state. Every year, these associations join together and spread awareness through various means of media, like commercials, posters, announcements. Recently, this month has been even further enforced due to the fact that the number of cases of mental illnesses in recent years has gravely increased, as shown in the graphic below.

source: IHME

As previously mentioned, and further developed by the graph, the Covid-19 pandemic caused a serious negative impact on the mental health of people, especially tennagers and young adults. This comes to show how the seclusion and isolation from not only friends and family, but also people in general, is seriously dangerous for the minds of young people. This can also be applied for our school, as we were no strangers to the mental problems imposed by the years of quarantine.

It’s important that our community of Giants takes into consideration how important it is to take care of our mental health, for both students and professionals, and how many times people may be trying to hide their problems. Make sure to always be aware of your friends, family, and peers and check whether they have been acting differently in a negative way, make sure to talk to them and understand what they are going through in order to prevent the worsening condition of their emotional and mental states.