Can Psychiatry Lead in Building Brain Capital? Why Mental Health Matters for Policy, Economy, and Society

The global conversation around mental health is changing. Rates of mental health, neurological, and substance use (MNS) conditions, cognitive decline, and burnout are increasingly recognized not only as public health challenges, but economic ones, with profound implications for productivity, resilience, and healthy longevity.¹ This shift is contributing to the emergence of a concept called brain capital: the combination of brain health—inclusive of neuropsychiatric conditions—and brain skills, defined as the skills that enable people to adapt, relate, and contribute meaningfully. Together, these elements serve as foundational drivers of human capability across the lifespan.² As highlighted in a January 2026 report from the World Economic Forum and the McKinsey Health Institute, The Human Advantage: Stronger Brains in the Age of AI, investing in brain capital is becoming a strategic priority for health systems, employers, and governments. Mental health services are central to this, as they are critical investments for safeguarding brain capital.

A May 2026 editorial in The Lancet Neurology highlighted a “brain health crossroads,” emphasizing the importance of brain health for societal prosperity, workforce participation, and longevity.³ The paper argues that the next phase of economic competitiveness will depend on brain capital—the collective cognitive, emotional, and social capacities of populations.

This framing arrives at a critical moment. MNS conditions are among the leading causes of disability globally. Mental health conditions continue to rise among younger generations amid a severe global shortage of mental health care workers—ranging from 55 per 100,000 people in high-income countries to <1 per 100,000 people in low-income countries.⁴ Alongside this, the rapid pace of AI development has opened the door to important opportunities to expand access to care while also introducing new clinical, ethical, and societal challenges.

Healthy brains are emerging as the operational energy of an economic order where the capability of the human brain is central to growth and competitiveness. This was demonstrated at the UCLA Brain Health Summit in March 2026, where leaders from across the brain health space reflected on the growing realization that brain health can no longer remain divided across medicine, policy, and technology.⁵ Instead, participants emphasized integrated approaches spanning prevention, precision medicine, digital health, community resilience, healthy aging, and economic strategy.Within this broader agenda, the question is not whether mental health services contribute to brain capital, but how clinicians and researchers can intentionally strengthen and demonstrate that contribution. The following topics deserve particular attention.

1. Measure and demonstrate the social, business, and economic impact of mental health.

Research on psychiatric interventions has traditionally emphasized clinical outcomes. There is now an opportunity to further understand the link between evidence-based mental health and broader organizational, economic, and societal resilience.

Analysis from the McKinsey Health Institute estimates that scaling cost-effective interventions to prevent, treat, and help individuals recover from brain health conditions could avert 267 million disability-adjusted life years globally by 2050, equivalent to an estimated $6.2 trillion in global GDP impact by 2050.⁶ These figures emphasize the potential impact of scaling widely available, evidence-based mental health services for individual, families, and economies.

This type of work is gaining a growing global audience and platform. Recent examples include a Science 7 joint statement on brain health signed by the heads of the national academies of science of all G7 countries,⁷ and a Business 7 joint statement from all G7 national chambers of commerce highlighting worker mental health as vital to corporate performance.⁸ The recently announced Nature Medicine Commission on Brain Health for Economic Resilience will further examine the links across these topics and develop a roadmap for measurement, research, and implementation.⁹

2. Embrace the broader concept of brain health.

The recent paper, The Neurologist's Role in Brain Health, argues that clinicians should increasingly move beyond disease-specific silos and toward a lifespan-based brain health approach.¹⁰ Psychiatry is well positioned to participate and help shape this broader movement.

Historically, siloed funding, training, and delivery systems have contributed to mental health, substance use, and neurological conditions being treated as separate domains. Yet neuroscience increasingly points towards shared biological pathways, overlapping risk factors, frequent comorbidities, and opportunities for more integrated approaches to prevention and care. Addressing the complexity of brain disorders requires collaboration across neuropsychiatry, neuropsychopharmacology, and the broader brain health field.

Embracing this interconnected view also means engaging more deeply with prevention science, lifestyle interventions, cognitive resilience, healthy aging, and social drivers of health. It requires disciplines that have historically operated separately to collaborate more intentionally across research, clinical care, and policy. These views are reflected in a May 2026 joint leadership perspective on brain health from the European Psychiatric Association and the European Academy of Neurology,¹¹ as well as in the creation of the International Alliance on Brain Health between the World Federation of Neurology and the World Psychiatric Association.¹² Efforts such as the World-Wide FINGERS initiative have translated evidence on multidomain dementia prevention into scalable implementation across dozens of countries,¹³ highlighting how integrated brain health approaches can advance research into practice.

3. Brain health is not mental health rebranded.

A broader brain health perspective does not diminish what is distinct and important about mental health. Rather, it highlights the need to integrate brain health education, monitoring, and care across the lifespan and throughout health systems, from pediatrics and primary care to obstetrics, gynecology, and other specialties. Recent efforts to establish a UN convention on the rights of older persons, initially shaped largely through aging and neurological perspectives, now create an opportunity to advance a more inclusive vision of brain health as a human right. These types of developments show why engaging with the broader brain health agenda can be impactful for the mental health community.^14,15As mental health frameworks evolve, brain health concepts can also help shape future diagnostic paradigms by placing greater emphasis on functioning, cognition, quality of life, developmental context, and biological measures. The American Psychiatric Association is exploring these issues through a new strategy for the future of the DSM, which aims to preserve the DSM as a trusted and relevant source of diagnostics as the field evolves.¹⁶

The mental health field also brings unique strengths to the broader brain health agenda, including recovery-oriented care, trauma-informed approaches based on lived experiences, and a long-standing focus on social drivers of health. For example, guidelines developed for mental health professionals on addressing the social drivers of mental health are relevant to a much broader range of health care professionals.¹⁷ These strengths can help make the brain capital agenda more person-centered and equitable.

4. Define and deliver mental health services in a way that demonstrates return on investment.

Demonstrating a clear return on investment is increasingly critical to secure the support, funding, and cross-sector partnerships needed to sustain funding for high-quality mental health care. A recent New England Journal of Medicine Catalyst article on “health solutions science” highlights the need to move beyond identifying problems toward systematically designing scalable solutions.¹⁸ Yet today, many evidence-based interventions still fail to scale into communities, schools, workplaces, and healthcare systems.

Integration of measurement science, systems thinking, behavioral economics, digital platforms, community partnerships, and real-world outcome measurement can help close this gap. People with lived experience should remain central partners in designing, implementing, and evaluating mental health services, ensuring that outcomes are meaningful and innovations improve care.

Emerging technologies, including AI, make this increasingly urgent. AI has considerable potential to improve access, personalization, and efficiency in mental health care. At the same time, poorly designed technologies risk fragmenting attention, amplifying anxiety, and degrading cognitive health. Efforts such as the Human-AI Impact Bench aim to evaluate how AI systems affect the brain and human behavior.^16,19 Mental health clinicians and researchers should play an active role in evaluating these technologies, setting ethical standards, and ensuring that they safeguard, rather than degrade, brain capital.

5. Articulate the link between brain health and brain skills, positioning mental health as foundational to brain capital.

Building brain capital depends not only on reducing the burden of MNS conditions but also on developing the brain skills that allow people to learn, adapt, and solve problems. The capacity to develop these skills is fundamentally shaped by brain health. MNS conditions can disrupt educational attainment, workforce participation, caregiving, and civic participation. Conversely, effective prevention, early intervention, treatment, and recovery support strengthen the underlying foundation on which these skills are developed.

Several recent, large-scale initiatives are focused on the intersection between brain health and brain skills. For example, the California Children and Youth Behavioral Health Initiative funds digital and in-person mental health services—mostly via schools—for all children and youth across the state.²⁰ In the context of workplace mental health, the One Mind at Work Index supports organizations in measuring program maturity and prioritizing areas for strategic investment.²¹

Better understanding and articulating the link between mental health and brain skills strengthens the case that investment in mental health is also an investment in brain capital.

Concluding Thoughts

Brain capital is not a policy slogan or mental health rebranded; it reflects an emerging recognition that healthy brains underpin every aspect of our societies and economies. This framing gives the mental health field a new way to articulate its value.

The challenge now is to move beyond reactive acute care models toward prevention, early intervention, treatment, and recovery approaches that strengthen brain capital across the life course. If the 20th century was defined by industrial capital and the early 21st century by digital capital, the coming decades may increasingly be defined by brain capital. Mental health can and should help lead that transition.

Dr Lavretsky is a professor in residence in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of California, Los Angeles, Semel Scholar in Integrative Mental Health, and director of Brain Health Innovation. She is a past president of the American Association for Geriatric Psychiatry, a distinguished fellow of the American Psychiatric Association and the American Association for Geriatric Psychiatry, and a fellow of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology. She is also on the Editorial Board of Psychiatric Times.

Dr Ajilore is the associate head for faculty development at the University of Illinois Center for Depression and Resilience. He is also a professor of psychiatry and the director of the Mood and Anxiety Disorders Program at the University of Illinois College of Medicine.

Dr Jeste is director of the Global Research Network on Social Determinants of Mental Health and Exposomics, president elect of the World Federation for Psychotherapy, and editor-in-chief of the International Psychogeriatrics journal, and a former professor of psychiatry and distinguished researcher at the University of California in San Diego, and former president of the American Psychiatric Association.

Ms Healy is the codirector of brain health for the McKinsey Health Institute.

Dr Eyre is the lead of Neuro-Policy and Harry Z. Yan and Weiman Gao Senior Fellow at Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy. He is also the Executive Director of the Global Brain Economy Initiative and an adjunct associate professor at the UCSF Department of Psychiatry.

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