The World Mental Health Week Leadership Summit Begins Tomorrow

Tomorrow, leaders across mental health, healthcare, science, policy, technology, culture and lived experience will come together in New York City for a day designed to move the conversation forward.

Wednesday, October 7, 2026

We are officially 24 hours away from the inaugural World Mental Health Week Leadership Summit, convened by the Global Mental Health Task Force at the United Nations Delegates Dining Room on October 8.

This gathering has been built around a simple belief: the scale and complexity of the mental health crisis demands more than any one organization, discipline or solution can provide.

It requires people who might not ordinarily find themselves in the same conversation to be in the same room.

Across the day, we will hear from leaders working in clinical care, neuroscience, policy, technology, youth and family services, addiction and recovery, veterans' mental health, entertainment, gaming and global leadership. We will also hear directly from people whose lived experiences bring these issues out of the abstract and into real life.

The program will explore mental health across the lifespan, the workforce required to deliver care, emerging treatments, innovation and access, addiction and parity, the role of leadership in a rapidly changing world, and the enormous influence that film, television, games and storytelling can have on the way we understand mental health.

Among the voices joining us are Patrick J. Kennedy, Ambassador Shefali Razdan Duggal, Lesli Linka Glatter, Rod Kempkes of Boys Town, Rawle Andrews Jr. of the American Psychiatric Association Foundation, Dr. Rachel Yehuda, Dr. Deborah Mash, Dr. Judith Joseph, and many others bringing expertise, leadership and lived experience to the room.

But tomorrow is not simply about putting remarkable people on a stage. It is about creating the conditions for different perspectives to meet, for ideas to cross sectors, and for conversations that begin in one room to become partnerships, commitments and action beyond it.

As we prepare to open the doors tomorrow, we are deeply grateful to every speaker, partner, supporter, team member and guest who has helped bring this gathering to life.

Mental health touches every family, every workplace, every community and every generation. The solutions will require the same breadth.

Tomorrow, we bring those worlds together.

And then the real work begins.