Prof Martin Knapp

This course is available on the MSc in Health Data Science, MSc in Health Policy, Planning and Financing, MSc in International Health Policy and MSc in International Health Policy (Health Economics). This course is freely available as an outside option to students on other programmes where regulations permit. It does not require permission. This course uses controlled access as part of the course selection process. For information on controlled access courses, including eligibility, application processes, deadlines, and departmental contact details, please refer to the Controlled Access Courses webpage.

Students are required to have some knowledge of health systems or mental health issues. 

The aim of this course is to consider how public policy can be shaped to address the many personal, social and economic challenges posed by mental illnesses, across the full life-course (indeed, some mental illnesses start earlier, with origins in the womb). Mental health will be considered in a range of contexts: high-, medium- and low-income settings. An important emphasis will be on the global nature of the challenges, and the need to find responses that have relevance across different societies and in different contexts.
The strong two-way associations with disadvantage will also be a core theme running through the course, linked to social and other determinants of (mental) health. Other key areas of policy-making will be covered, including how decision-making balances the roles of different stakeholders, particularly individuals with lived experience of mental illness, families and communities. We will look at whether and how policy decisions are based on considerations of (and evidence about) the effectiveness, cost-effectiveness and viability of treatments, the distributional consequences, and the social impact of prevention and interventions in different cultural contexts and at different life-stages.
Students will discuss issues and strategies on how public policy – not just in the health sector but more widely – can play crucial roles in prevention (or at least risk-reduction), access to and funding of treatments and therapies, recovery and re-integration, social and economic inclusion, and equity of access and experience. Some of the material in the course will be based on research recently undertaken or currently underway at LSE.

Course outline (by week)

1 & 2. Mental Illness: Definition, Causes, Consequences and Policy Responses (two lectures)

3. Perinatal Mental Illness

4. Early Intervention and Prevention in Youth

5. Stigma, Mental Capacity and Human Rights

6. Knowing Our Own Minds: Experiential Knowledge and Learning from UK Service User/Survivor

7. Using Research to Achieve Policy Impact: Examples from LSE Research

8. Autism: a Litmus Test for Public Policy

9. Mental Health in Old Age, Focusing on Dementia

10. Enduring Challenges: Translating Evidence and Experience into Policy 

This course has a reading week in Week 6 of Winter Term.

The course will be delivered in no less than 20 hours and consists of lectures and seminars delivered in the Winter Term.

Students will be expected to produce 1 essay in the Winter Term (of up to 1500 words) during the course, which could be linked to the topic of their group-based project.

• Patel V, Saxena S, Lund C et al (2018) The Lancet Commission on global mental health and sustainable development. Lancet 392(10157):1553-1598.  

• Saxena S, Thornicroft G, Knapp M, Whiteford H (2007) Scarcity, inequity and inefficiency of resources: three major obstacles to better mental health. Lancet 370:878-889.  

• Herrman H, Patel V, Kieling C et al. (2022) Time for united action on depression: a Lancet-World Psychiatric Association Commission. Lancet 399(10328):957-1022  

• Kirkbride JB et al (2024) The social determinants of mental health and disorder: evidence, prevention and recommendations. World Psychiatry 23(1):58-90.  

• Ridley M, Rao G, Schilbach F, Patel V (2020) Poverty, depression, and anxiety: Causal evidence and mechanisms. Science 370. The full paper is on Moodle. 

• WHO (2025) Guidance on mental health policy and strategic action plans. Genevea: WHO. 

• McGorry P, Gunasiri H, Mei C, Rice S, Gao C X. (2025). The youth mental health crisis: analysis and solutions. Frontiers in psychiatry, 15, 1517533.  

• Uhlhaas PJ, Davey CG, Mehta UM et al (2023) Towards a youth mental health paradigm: a perspective and roadmap. Molecular Psychiatry 28(8):3171-3181. 

• Leamy M, Bird V, Le Boutillier C, Williams J, Slade M (2011) Conceptual framework for personal recovery in mental health: systematic review and narrative synthesis. British Journal of Psychiatry 199(6):445-452.  

• Thornicroft G, Sunkel C, Alikhon Aliev A et al (2022) The Lancet Commission on ending stigma and discrimination in mental health. Lancet 400(10361):1438-1480.  

• McDaid D, Park AL, Knapp M (2017) Commissioning cost-effective services for promotion of mental health and wellbeing and prevention of mental ill-health. London: Public Health England. 

• Quinn A (2024) Five ways staff can humanise mental health care for autistic people British Psychological Society. 

• Fombonne E (2025) The autism ‘epidemic’: misinterpretation, misinformation and conspiracy. European Journal of Epidemiology 40:981-994.   

• Faulkner A (2017) Survivor research and Mad Studies: the role and value of experiential knowledge in mental health research. Disability & Society 32(4):500-520.  

• Owens C, Fox F, Redwood S et al (2020) Measuring outcomes in trials of interventions for people who self-harm: qualitative study of service users’ views. British Journal of Psychiatry Open 6(e22):1–8.  

• Livingston G, Huntley J, Liu K et al (2024) Dementia prevention, intervention, and care: 2024 report of the Lancet standing Commission. Lancet 404:572-628 

• Mukadam N, Anderson R, Knapp M et al (2020) Effective interventions for potentially modifiable risk factors for late-onset dementia: a costs and cost-effectiveness modelling study. Lancet Healthy Longevity 1(1):e13-e20.  

• Patel V, Saxena S, Lund C et al (2023) Transforming mental health systems globally: principles and policy recommendations. Lancet 402(10402):656-666. 

• Knapp M, Wong G (2020) Economics and mental health: the current scenario. World Psychiatry 19(1):3-14. 

Essay (100%, 3000 words).