By Ladi A. Stephen

What if one of our greatest missed opportunities in preventing future mental health challenges begins with how we care for mothers today?

On this World Mental Health Day, I find myself reflecting on a critical intersection that deserves far greater attention: maternal wellbeing, mental health, and the health of future generations.

We have made important progress in advancing maternal and child health. Yet, in many settings, our conversations about maternal health still focus heavily on survival, sometimes overlooking the emotional, psychological, and social wellbeing of the women behind the statistics. A mother can survive childbirth and still be struggling to thrive.

This conversation is deeply personal to me because beyond my professional interest in strengthening health systems, I understand that motherhood is not always a seamless journey of happiness, strength, and fulfilment as often portrayed. Behind the milestones and celebrations can be moments of physical exhaustion, emotional vulnerability, unspoken fears, and the pressure to keep showing up for everyone else. Sometimes, what a mother needs most is not another reminder to be strong, but the reassurance that her own wellbeing matters too. It is this human reality that strengthens my conviction that we must rethink what comprehensive maternal healthcare truly means.

The reality we cannot afford to overlook
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), almost one in five women experience a mental health condition during pregnancy or within the first year after childbirth.
Let that sink in.

Behind the joy of welcoming a new life may be a woman navigating anxiety, depression, emotional distress, financial pressures, or the overwhelming responsibility of caring for a child while trying to hold herself together. Yet many of these experiences go unrecognized, undiscussed, or inadequately addressed. This is not a marginal maternal health concern. It is a significant public health challenge that demands deliberate attention, investment, and action. Importantly, it presents an opportunity to make a meaningful difference before challenges deepen or become crises.

Maternal mental health: An investment in prevention and intergenerational wellbeing
Maternal mental health matters profoundly in its own right. It can also influence a mother’s relationships, her engagement with healthcare, and the nurturing environment in which her child grows and develops. Quality maternal healthcare, timely mental health support, and strong family and community support systems can reduce certain preventable risks and create healthier foundations for both mother and child.

Maternal mental health is not a peripheral issue. It is a critical component of maternal healthcare and an investment in intergenerational wellbeing. We must therefore expand our approach beyond treatment alone to include prevention, early identification, timely intervention, and sustained support.

Interestingly, the pathways for action are not entirely new. WHO has developed evidence-informed guidance for integrating perinatal mental healthcare into maternal and child health services. Which brings me to a question I believe deserves much greater attention from leaders, policymakers, funders, and health professionals:
If we know maternal mental health matters, and we have guidance on what can be done, why does it still struggle to command the attention, resources, and accountability it deserves?
The challenge is not simply one of awareness. It is also a question of priorities, investment, implementation, and the strength of our health systems. The gap between what we know and what women experience must become a leadership priority.

What this means for Africa
For Africa, where we continue to work towards reducing preventable maternal deaths, strengthening primary healthcare, and improving child health outcomes, maternal mental health must become a more deliberate part of our health systems agenda. We cannot afford to separate maternal survival from maternal wellbeing. We should not treat mental healthcare as an optional addition to services intended to protect mothers and children.
This requires intentional leadership and stronger health systems that:
•    Integrate mental healthcare into routine antenatal and postnatal services, including appropriate screening, assessment, support, and referral pathways.
•    Equip healthcare workers with the skills and resources to recognize and respond compassionately to maternal mental health challenges.
•    Improve access to quality, affordable, culturally responsive mental healthcare, including for women in underserved communities.
•    Strengthen support systems by engaging partners, families, employers, and communities in promoting maternal wellbeing.
•    Embed accountability by making maternal mental health part of healthcare quality standards, programme implementation, investment decisions, and performance measurement.
But there is another dimension we cannot overlook. We must listen to mothers themselves.

The 2026 World Mental Health Day theme, “Lived experiences heard: real voices, real change,” reinforces the importance of meaningful participation by people with lived experience in shaping mental health policies and services.
For maternal mental health, this means moving beyond simply inviting mothers to share their stories. Their experiences must influence how services are designed, delivered, funded, and evaluated. Listening is important. But listening must lead to change Because the real test of a policy is not how compelling it sounds in a conference room, but the difference it makes in the lives of the people it is intended to serve.

From awareness to accountability: A leadership imperative
As leaders, we must be willing to ask harder questions about the gap between evidence and action.
What are we prioritizing?
What are we investing in?
What are we measuring?
Perhaps most importantly, what are women actually experiencing when they seek care?
We cannot claim to have achieved comprehensive maternal healthcare if mental health remains insufficiently recognized, inadequately resourced, or disconnected from routine care. We cannot fully measure progress by counting the lives saved without also considering the quality of life and wellbeing of the women who survive.

Survival is essential. But survival alone is not the full measure of maternal health. A mother deserves more than to survive pregnancy and childbirth. She deserves the opportunity to recover, to be supported, to be heard, and to thrive. Not simply because her wellbeing influences the future of her child, but because her mental health, dignity, and quality of life matter in their own right. This is where my personal conviction meets my professional commitment.

I want to see health systems in which maternal mental health is no longer an afterthought. Systems where women do not have to reach a crisis before their distress is recognized.

Systems that understand that supporting a mother means caring for the whole person, not simply monitoring the pregnancy or the outcome of childbirth. Systems where mental healthcare is accessible, compassionate, integrated, and responsive to the realities of women’s lives.

On this World Mental Health Day, my call is for us to move beyond awareness towards deliberate decisions, stronger investments, better implementation, and measurable improvements in the quality of maternal healthcare because how we care for mothers today has consequences far beyond today. It shapes the wellbeing of families, the strength of communities, and the foundations on which future generations grow.
We have spent decades fighting to ensure that mothers survive. We must bring that same urgency, intentionality, and accountability to ensuring that mothers thrive. So, I leave us with one question:
What would change if maternal mental health were treated not as an additional service, but as an essential measure of healthcare quality?
#WorldMentalHealthDay #MaternalMentalHealth #MaternalHealth #MentalHealth #HealthSystemsStrengthening #WomensHealth #Africa