Recovery, Citizenship, and Personhood of People with Lived Experience of Mental Health Problems during the Pandemic: Two Expert Focus Groups

Abstract

The pandemic has dealt a severe blow to everyone, but especially to people with previous vulnerabilities, such as people with lived experience of mental health problems. Studies on the increased incidence of all types of mental disorders have been published incessantly since the beginning of the pandemic. However, not much has been said about the impact of the pandemic in terms of their rights, already hampered by stigma and social discrimination before the pandemic. The full inclusion of people with lived experience of mental health problems as full citizens is a limitation in all societies, and it implies a burden in their recovery journeys. In these pandemic times, we think the rights of persons with lived experience of mental health problems deserves special attention. We carried out two focus groups with 17 key participants with different mental health expertise from three Spanish-speaking countries (Chile, Colombia, and Spain) to consider possible violations of rights that have occurred in the pandemic context but also experiences of individual and collective resilience that have helped maintain well-being among this group of people.