Welcome to the IMH Department of Mental Health and Human Rights.
Mental health is a basic human right for all people.
Everyone, whoever and wherever they are, has a deserving and inherent right to the highest attainable standard of mental health.
This includes:
- the right to available, accessible, acceptable and good quality care; and
- the right to liberty, independence and inclusion in the community.
Having a mental health condition should never be a reason to deprive a person of their human rights or to exclude them from decisions about their own health.
International human rights law is a body of laws and principles that govern the protection
and promotion of human rights at the international level. These laws are designed to ensure
that individuals and groups are protected from discrimination, violence, and other abuses of
their human rights.
