Biography

Helen Herrman is President of the World Psychiatric Association (WPA) 2017-2020 and Director of the World Health Organization (WHO) Collaborating Centre in Mental Health, Melbourne. She is Professor of Psychiatry at Orygen, and The University of Melbourne, Australia. She has received the award of Officer of the Order of Australia.

She is a member of The Lancet Commission on Global Mental Health and Sustainable Development, and chairs The Lancet-WPA Commission on depression due to report in 2020. She is co-chair for the World Economic Forum Global Future Council on Technology for Mental Health 2019-20.

In the past, as Professor and Director of Psychiatry in St. Vincent’s Health Melbourne she led the development of an integrated area mental health service under Australia’s national reform of mental health care. For one year she acted as regional adviser in mental health for the WHO’s Western Pacific Region. Her research and practice interests in the fields of community mental health care, promoting mental health and women’s mental health include the mental health of marginalised groups such as young women and men living in state care. She leads the WPA’s action plan 2017-2020, concerned with supporting the contribution of psychiatrists to global mental health.