Establishing the 1st International Treaty for Rights and Duties in Mental Health

Experience makes us see the importance of seeking standardized protocols in the treatment and daily maintenance of people in mental health programs. Research, case studies, and other evidence signals that the world tends to produce knowledge multilateral. The most varied countries can give rise to more adequate and practically experienced management, which can improve the quality of life and the effectiveness of the proposed therapeutic approach.

In several regions of the world, people conceptualize mental health ‘treatment’ based on the idea of ​​disease. To do so involves elements of mental health already surpassed. Today, we need more active participation from patients, not less, like disease models. 

The patient is the protagonist and must be humanized and active in treatment. For example, in the United States, this conservative approach was gradually replaced by the mental health promotion narrative. Patients receive multidisciplinary assistance and end up stabilized and fully healed. 

A successful case that policymakers could replicate internationally if we already had an international channel for discussion on the topic. I am proposing something new, transparent, and in line with International Humanitarianism. In my theory, nations create an academic database. All information and scientific notes obtained in academe, i.e., research, would be recorded. This database serves to equip other countries to face their challenges. 

The genesis of the database, its delivery, and rollout in the community must be congruent with a structure following the lines of Human Rights as information begins to enter and disseminate in the most diverse countries of the world–its privileged status satisfying everyday norms.

When ratified, the ‘Human Rights Treaty and signed by States contributing, such as signers of the Universal Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen, will receive a very different procedure precisely because it starts from the idea that humanitarian issues are urgent and deserve prompt attention. Furthermore, the very intellectual content of the text already indicates that it is something covered by Humanitarian Law. After all, we are talking about the Right to Health, which derives directly from the Right to Life, the main focus of human rights activists.

Within this first panel, we welcome the hypothesis of acceptance and ratification of the lines of the international agreement. However, it is an academic database, even if not yet enforceable by law. The data can serve as a basis for studies and even suggest therapeutic approaches to be given by health professionals Worldwide. 

All this without forgetting that – with a theoretical framework of this completeness – we would be facing a very favorable scenario for creating local centers for the protection and defense of the interests of those involved in mental health programs.

Far beyond medical lines, I propose that this mental health information center have instructions to be addressed to public security professionals and other State agents who deal directly with the population. Health officials and professionals must systematically act when humanity needs help.  

In terms of containing individuals in crisis or psychotic outbreaks, recent history shows us how many lives could be here. Police and state agents had adequate humanitarian training to deal with incidents involving people undergoing treatment, which would initiate care in specialized medical units after such an event.

Finally, one cannot ignore the technological resources that exist today and fail to make them powerful tools for disseminating knowledge. In this sense, social networks and support software can develop a virtual learning environment capable of enabling training, classes, lectures, workshops, and several other forms of international transmission of knowledge, creating a large team of appropriately qualified and able to develop a multidisciplinary and integrative work. 

In an organized way and in complete alignment with Human Rights principles, building a sizeable practical-advisory database with differentiated access levels based on each of its users would be a matter. Such data allows for professionalism in data management, not to mention compliance with the most varied security and data protection rules internationally spread.

Therefore, I will finish this article with the thought physical borders should only prevail only for geopolitical issues. We must set limits on national borders. The policies created must assess our relationship to national borders. There can be no border that takes privilege when Human Rights are at risk.

For humanitarian protection, we are all human beings who deserve the care inherent in a program like this, regardless of the mere detail of residing in one country or another.