‘You won’t be elected if you talk about your depression’

When MP Mario Galea decided to speak out about the depression he was going through four years ago, several people tried to put him off, warning him that he would be killing off his political career. “They were certain that I would not get elected but in the end I decided not to take their advice,” says Mr Galea. Instead he decided to shatter “the deafening silence” on mental health issues and speak publicly about his illness, risking the stigma that comes along with it. “If you go to Mater Dei suffering from, say, pancreatitis, you’d tell everyone about it, you’d even put up a message on Facebook to share with your friends,” says Mr Galea, a nurse by profession. “But if you’re suffering from any mental illness – then you hide it for fear of being shunned.” He blames social taboo on all forms of mental illness as the reason when several people do not reach out for a cure. Because of his nursing background and because his wife is a clinical psychologist, it did not take him long to realise that he was suffering from depression. “It was triggered by stress: a feeling of helplessness and hopelessness, fatigue, anxiety and insomnia.” It took him a year of acute treatment – including...