# How public perception of mental health has shifted

- **Episode:** [195](https://agents.truthliesandwork.com/episodes/195.md) (2025-05-08)
- **Type:** interview
- **Tags:** mental-health, public-perception, societal-change
- **Time:** 4:10–7:11 (start 250s)
- **Listen:** [https://truthliesandwork.com/195?t=250](https://truthliesandwork.com/195?t=250)

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[4:10] Leanne Elliott: How do you think the public's perception of mental health has shifted over the years?
[4:15] Sarah Hughes: That's a really interesting question because on one hand, You know, I have worked in mental health for 35 years, and it's true to say that when I first started, you know, there was no way we could talk about mental health in the way that we do now. There was no conversations between friends. There weren't conversations in families. There certainly wasn't conversations in workplaces. And even those of us who worked in mental health, you know, you couldn't really tell people because, you know, there was a sort of almost disdain and weird reaction. So to be, you know, 35 years later in an organisation that has really changed the conversation is quite an extraordinary thing, that we're talking about it in schools, we're talking about it in pubs, in barbers, in workplaces. You know, that's absolutely true. What I would say though is, um, whilst our literacy has definitely improved, would I hand on my heart say people experiencing serious mental illness would say, you know, we're getting the best services ever, we, we're getting access when we need it, all of those things. Um, I think some people would say yes, but I, I think there'd be a lot of people that would say no. And so the job is nowhere near done. Progress, yes, but we're not anywhere near where we need to be
[5:34] Leanne Elliott: And it has been a turbulent time for all of us really over the past few years. Some You know, of course, and sadly more than others, but how would you, how would you describe the, the mental health of, of the nation?
[5:46] Sarah Hughes: It's been probably the most worrying 5 years. You know, there's no doubt about it. We've actually had quite a long time of global volatility, of financial stress and pressure. You know, before the pandemic, we had austerity, you know, so all of these things have eroded mental health. And so what we know is that there is an increase in prevalence. There is an increase in people seeking help for their mental health. I always have to be really careful though, and this is some of the issues around language and how we think about things now, that I don't want to pathologize the nation. So we're not all mentally ill. We've all got mental health. But we're not all mentally ill. There is a spectrum that, you know, some of us travel up and down. Some of us who experience very serious mental illness exist in a different world often from everybody else because their experience is so different. So we often merge the two together, mental health and mental illness, and that often can leave people with mental illness aside. So whilst I acknowledge that the prevalence has increased, We've also got to understand that within that group of people that are experiencing, um, deterioration in their mental health, that there will be people that will be worse off than others, even within that group