Global Mental Health Statistics: Prevalence, Suicide and Care Gaps

In 2023, nearly 1 in every 7 people around the world, or 1.2 billion, were living with a mental disorder [1]. Anxiety and depressive disorders were the most common [1]. WHO notes that effective prevention and treatment exist, but most people with mental disorders do not have access to effective care [1].

In September 2025 WHO published two reports, World mental health today and Mental Health Atlas 2024, and summarised the headline finding as more than 1 billion people living with mental health disorders [2]. The fact sheet figure of 1.2 billion for 2023 and the rounded "more than 1 billion" are consistent with each other [1][2].

WHO's fact sheet gives these 2023 counts [1]:

• Anxiety disorders: 470 million people, including 146 million children and adolescents [1].
• Depression: 322 million people, including 43 million children and adolescents [1].
• Conduct-dissocial disorder: 39 million children and adolescents [1].
• Bipolar disorder: 36 million people, including 3.3 million adolescents aged 10-19 [1].
• Schizophrenia: about 27 million people, or 1 in 300 people worldwide [1].
• Eating disorders: 18 million people, including 4.7 million children and adolescents [1].

People with schizophrenia die on average nine years earlier than the general population [1]. The categories overlap in people with more than one condition, so the counts should not be added together.

Every year 727,000 people take their own life, and many more attempt suicide [3]. Suicide was the third leading cause of death among 15-29-year-olds globally in 2021 [3]. Close to three quarters (73%) of global suicides occurred in low- and middle-income countries in 2021 [3].

Only 38 countries report having a national suicide prevention strategy [3]. Only some 80 WHO Member States have good-quality vital registration data that can be used directly to estimate suicide rates, so under-reporting is likely [3]. Reducing the suicide rate is the only mental health indicator in the UN Sustainable Development Goals [3].

WHO's 2025 reports cover data from 144 countries [4]. The global median number of mental health workers is 13 per 100,000 people, with an extreme shortage in low- and middle-income countries [4]. In low-income countries fewer than 10% of affected people receive care, compared with more than 50% in higher-income countries [4].

WHO's priorities include fairer financing of mental health services, rights-based legislation, more investment in the mental health workforce and a shift towards community-based care [5].

Prevalence counts come from the WHO mental disorders fact sheet, which reports 2023 estimates for disorders defined under ICD-11 [1]. Suicide figures come from the WHO suicide fact sheet [3]. Workforce and care-coverage figures are from WHO's September 2025 reports as reported by Health Policy Watch [4], with context from WHO's own release [2] and UN News [5]. Counts are people, not cases, and conditions overlap, so they are not summed. No FREEE.REPORT calculations are used.