[Towards effective public mental health care in the 21st century].

Background: For long, people have been advocating for an overarching national long-term plan for prevention of mental health problems. However, such a plan is still lacking in the Netherlands.

Aim: An exercise was conducted exploring societal trends that may support the idea that a public movement strong enough to make on overarching long-term plan could be feasible in the coming years, notwithstanding the current political climate in which prevention doesn’t seem to be high on the agenda.

Method: A literature search for elements that could facilitate this overarching multi-tier plan.

Results: Ten factors could contribute to the development of a collective plan: enormous burden of disease due to mental problems; great public awareness; ready-made conceptual framework; focus on well-being and health; the anchoring of the calculation of the costs and benefits for prevention in law; compelling scarcity; broadly supported prevention plan; digital personalized prevention; broad leadership and resistance among professionals; shift of attention: from individual to system.

Conclusion: There are sufficient reasons to assume that on overarching plan for prevention prevention of mental health problems could be currently feasible. Therefore, collective action of the broad field of psychiatry is warranted.