Good mental health is critical to individuals’ well-being and productivity. Living with mental ill-health can contribute to poorer educational outcomes, higher unemployment rates, and worse physical health. Nearly half of people in OECD countries experience a mental health problem at some point in their lives, and at any given time up to one in five people are living with a mental health condition (OECD, 2021[1]).
Data from PaRIS shows that living with a chronic condition reduces people’s overall well-being (Figure 3.19). On average, primary care users aged 45 and over without chronic conditions reported an average well-being score of 70 out of 100, whereas those with chronic conditions reported a well-being score ten points lower (60 out of 100). Average well-being decreases with each additional chronic condition, underscoring the importance of good healthcare and mental health care for people with multi-morbidity (see section on “Chronic conditions”) (OECD, 2025[2]).
Without effective treatment and support, mental health problems can sometimes lead to self-harm and suicide. In 2023, the average suicide rate in OECD countries was 10.7 per 100 000 population, with the highest rates in Korea (23.2 per 100 000) and Lithuania (18 per 100 000) (Figure 3.20). Gender differences in mortality from suicide are significant. In 2023, the suicide rate among men was more than 3.4 times higher than the rate among women, at 17.2 deaths per 100 000 men compared to 5 deaths per 100 000 women on average across OECD countries. In Latvia and Poland this difference was even larger, with the suicide mortality rate among men 7.6 times higher than the rate among women in Latvia, and 6.1 times higher among men than among women in Poland. Thanks in part to significant investment in suicide prevention policies, deaths by suicide have been falling in OECD countries in recent years, from 15.1 per 100 000 in 2003 to 10.7 per 100 000 in 2023 (OECD, 2021[1]).
While men are far more likely than women to die by suicide, the gender gap in suicidal intent and behaviour is far smaller – and in some instances is even reversed, with higher rates among women (Vargas Lopes and Llena-Nozal, 2025[3]). Data for hospitalisations due to self-harm confirm this pattern. The number of women hospitalised due to self-harm is significantly higher than for men in all countries with available data (Figure 3.21). In 2023, women were hospitalised 1.7 times more than men on average due to self-harm for 16 OECD countries, at a rate of 66 per 100 000 women compared to 39 per 100 000 men. The biggest gender differences were observed in Finland and the Netherlands, where women were hospitalised for self-harm almost 2.5 times more than men.
Effective strategies to reduce death by suicide include good access to mental health care, targeted suicide prevention strategies, and mental health awareness and anti-stigma campaigns (OECD, 2021[1]). Effective suicide prevention measures, such as the ones included in Austria’s SUPRA programme, ensure support for high-risk groups, restrict access to suicidal means, raise awareness and support, and integrate suicide prevention into broader health promotion activities (OECD, 2025[4]). By focussing on post-hospitalisation monitoring after a suicide attempt, the French suicide prevention programme VigilanS has helped reduce repeat suicide attempts among the intervention population by an estimated 24% annually (OECD, 2025[4]).
