Deepika Padukone receives the 2020 Crystal Award in Davos for her leadership in raising mental health awareness
Deepika Padukone, Actor and Founder, The Live Love Laugh Foundation (TLLLF), was honored with the 26th Annual Crystal Award at the opening session of the World Economic Forum’s 2020 Annual Meeting that took place last night in Davos.
The Crystal Award instituted by the World Economic Forum celebrates the achievements of artists and cultural figures whose leadership inspires inclusive and sustainable change.
The other Crystal Award winners this year are artists Theaster Gates (US) and Lynette Wallworth (Australia) and choreographer Jin Xing (China).
Presenting the award, Hilde Schwab, Chairperson and Co-Founder, Schwab Foundation for Social Entrepreneurship, World Economic Forum noted that Deepika had shown immense courage when she spoke out publicly in 2015 about her depression, and in the process had contributed significantly to lifting the stigma around mental health in India.
“$1 trillion dollars is the estimated impact caused by anxiety and depression on the global economy. It is important to understand that anxiety and depression are like any other illness and are treatable. However, in my experience acceptance is the first step,” said Deepika Padukone, Founder, The Live Love Laugh Foundation (TLLLF) speaking at the award ceremony.
“As key stakeholders in shaping the global mental health narrative prioritizing mental health in the workplace and various other communities; integrating mental health curriculum in educational institutions; providing accessibility to affordable mental health care; and; enhancing funding for mental health are some of the focus areas that we believe are the need of the hour,” she added.
Today, 21 January 2020, the World Economic Forum will host a one-on-one session with Deepika Padukone and Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director General of WHO at 14:45 CET (Central European Time) / 19:15 IST) at which they will share insights and experience on tackling the stigma surrounding mental illness.
Background:
The Live Love Laugh Foundation aims to provide hope to every person experiencing stress anxiety and depression and has undertaken work in the following areas: Awareness programmes in schools covering over 1,50,000 adolescents and 16000 teachers across eleven cities in India; Funding free psychiatric treatment in low income communities; Collaborative partnerships to run Continuing Medical Education programmes in Common Mental Disorders for General Practitioners; Nationwide public awareness campaigns to destigmatize mental illness; An annual lecture series featuring some of the world’s foremost thinkers and achievers and research.
In 2016, the award-winning Dobara Poocho (“Ask Again”) campaign undertaken by the foundation received in excess of 560 million total impressions across TV, print and digital mediums. The #NotAshamed campaign in 2018 featured original narratives encouraging other survivors to share their story with the world and garnered more than 100 million impressions across platforms.
In October this year, TLLLF was named the 2019 recipient of the prestigious Dr Guislain “Breaking the Chains of Stigma” Award. The global award, which is an initiative of the Dr Guislain Museum in Ghent, Belgium and Janssen Research and Development, LLC honors TLLLF’s efforts to change the dialogue around mental illness in India.