Today we celebrate this day to raise awareness about mental health. This day is observed annually on October 10th.
This year’s theme is to raise awareness to prevent suicide around the world. Every 40 seconds, someone loses their life and commits suicide. This is the day for global mental health education, awareness and advocacy against social stigma.
This day was first celebrated in 1992 at the initiative of the World Federation for Mental Health, a global mental health organization with members and contacts in more than 150 countries. Thousands of supporters come joins this annual awareness program to bring attention to mental illness and its major effects on people’s lives worldwide.
People who are affected with a mental illness commits an act of intention to end their own life due to many factors. Some mental disorders include depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, anxiety disorders, and substance abuse, including alcoholism and the use of benzodiazepines, which is one of the risk factors.
Study shows that some suicides are impulsive acts due to stress, financial difficulties, breakups, or bullying, and those who have previously attempted suicide are at higher risk. Approximately 20% of suicides have had a previous attempt, and of those who have attempted suicide, 1% complete suicide within a year and more than 5% die by suicide within 10 years.
Effective suicide prevention efforts include limiting access to methods of suicide—such as firearms, drugs, and poisons; treating mental disorders and substance misuse; careful media reporting about suicide; and improving economic conditions.
So, today, celebrated this day by helping to prevent suicide and other incidents caused by mental illness and show your support by sharing on social media about the awareness using #MentalHealthDay.
1987 Whitesnake’s iconic video features Jaguars
On this day in 1987, the song “Here I Go Again” by English hard-rock group Whitesnake tops the Billboard pop singles chart in the United States. Today, what most people remember about the song is its saucy video: The actress Tawny Kitaen spends a great deal of it in a white negligee, writhing and cartwheeling across the hoods of two Jaguars parked next to one another. It is one of the most iconic music videos of the 1980s, and it features two of the most famous cars in pop-culture history.
Whitesnake first released “Here I Go Again” in 1982, on the album “Saints and Sinners.” That early version didn’t crack the charts–so, five years later, the band re-recorded the song and included the new, more amped-up version on their album “Whitesnake.” While they were working on the record, the band’s lead singer David Coverdale started dating a young woman named Tawny Kitaen, who had recently starred opposite Tom Hanks in the movie “bachelor party.” When director Marty Callner met Kitaen, he was smitten too–and he cast her immediately in the video for “Here I Go Again.” “I knew I wanted to have a sexy woman in it,” Callner told a reporter. “Sex is a part of rock ‘n’ roll and the song was about sex.”
(excerpted from https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/whitesnakes-iconic-video-features-jaguars)
