We applaud Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong's announcement of an inter-agency Covid-19 Mental Wellness Taskforce (Task force to tackle mental health needs amid pandemic, Oct 11).

This not only recognises the critical work which lies ahead in restoring our mental resilience as a people but also underscores the fact that mental health is a basic necessity for us all to live productive and meaningful lives.

While the task force's mission is to review the pandemic's psycho-social impact and identify gaps in mental health needs during this time, we hope that it will not overlook our long-term and fundamental mental health needs, especially of our young people.

We appreciate that prior to the pandemic, many national committees like NurtureSG Taskforce and HealthySG Taskforce had already made good recommendations.

To take Singapore forward, however, it is crucial to implement systemic changes to our social, educational and healthcare infrastructures for mental health improvements to be sustained beyond this pandemic.

It follows then that we need a dedicated national agency to lead and coordinate the work to be carried out.

The PleaseStay.Movement, founded by suicide-bereaved mothers, is concerned that short-term, piecemeal solutions for mental healthcare are costly and may not adequately address the complex nature of mental illness which could lead to downstream tragedies like youth suicides.

The magnitude of mental health problems demands the focus of a single agency devoted to integrating programmes that overlap and streamlining processes to better involve families, schools and the public.

This agency must be empowered to influence policymaking across ministries and improve delivery of mental health services like removing cost barriers and improving ratios of student to school counsellor and mental health patient to doctor.

It could drive accreditation to upgrade the quality of psychotherapy here, optimise the use of technology for data collection and analyses, and more.

We stand ready to support any initiative in mental health wellness and suicide prevention, and hope to work together to help ensure that our younger generation can lead safer and more hopeful lives.

Valerie Lim

PleaseStay.Movement

An advocacy group on youth suicide prevention