ByN. Lothungbeni Humtsoe

October 9, 2021 (IANSlife) Twitter is committed to promoting conversations around mental health by encouraging people to share their experiences while reaching others. Since the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic, it has played a critical role in keeping people connected and amplifying authoritative information from credible sources. Between April 01 - May 31, 2021, mental well-being was top of mind for people. The service saw a 153 percent increase in conversations about mental well-being during the second wave of Covid-19.

As the world observes #WorldMentalHealthDay on October 10, the platform continues to work with its mental health partners in India and around the world to foster dialogue about #MentalHeath, and share how product features such as Twitter Lists empower people to customise their ‘feed’ - to be able to discover and recommend accounts that resonate with what matters to them.

A-List is a compilation of various Twitter accounts. You can create your custom Lists, or follow Lists created by others. Viewing a List timeline will show you a series of Tweets from only the accounts on that list, making it easier for people to find what interests them. Leveraging this feature, various organisations have come forward ahead of World Mental Health Day to create Lists of credible accounts that people can follow for information and awareness around the topic of mental health. These include:

Mental health’ as a subject continues to have various stigmas associated with it across certain sections of society, due to which people suffering from mental health concerns may not be able to communicate their struggles in their immediate surroundings. Open internet and services like Twitter can be a source of positive support, encouraging people who may be struggling to reach out for professional help. They also contribute towards creating an interconnected space to raise diverse perspectives and resources to confront mental health challenges. 

Globally, it has a list of international resources where people can go to find more information and details of relevant organisations within their respective countries and has activated a special, green ribbon emoji to amplify conversations around mental health. The emoji will be live until the end of October and can be generated by using any hashtags.

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N. Lothungbeni Humtsoe can be contacted at lothungbeni.h@ians.in