10 Percent of World's Population Suffers from Mental Disorder: WHO

According to WHO's 2014 Mental Health Atlas, nearly half of the world's population lives in a country where there is less than one psychiatrist per 100,000 people, while in high-income countries the rate is one per 2,000.

"The prevalence of depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorders and drug abuse vary significantly more between different societies and there are some cultural factors for that," Saxena added.

Through its Mental Health Atlas WHO has also layer down the Comprehensive mental health action plan 2013-2020 targets, and baseline values for 2013, some of which are as follows:

• 80% of countries will have developed or updated their policies or plans for mental health in line with international and regional human rights instruments by the year 2020.
  - Baseline: 45% of all WHO Member States


• 50% of countries will have developed or updated their law for mental health in line with international and regional human rights instruments by the year 2020.
  - Baseline: 34% of all WHO Member States


• Service coverage for severe mental disorders will have increased by 20% by the year 2020.
  - Baseline: Currently not computable from Atlas 2014 data


• 80% of countries will have at least two functioning national, multisectoral mental health promotion and prevention programmes by the year 2020.
  - Baseline: 41% of all WHO Member States


• The rate of suicide in countries will be reduced by 10%.
  - Baseline: 11.4 per 100 000 population


• 80% of countries will be routinely collecting and reporting at least a core set of mental health indicators every two years through their national health and social information systems by the year 2020.
  - Baseline: 33% of all WHO Member States