Mental Health Cannot Wait
Over 116 million people across the African continent are living with mental health conditions and fewer than one in 10 receives any care, the stakes could not be higher.
Public Health Systems
Reimagining health systems to integrate mental wellness at the primary care level.
Policy Agendas
Influencing continental and global frameworks to prioritize mental health equity.
Investment Priorities
Mobilizing resources from public and private sectors for scalable interventions.
More Than a Conference — A Turning Point
The Africa at the Centre Conference 2027 is where the evidence meets the will to act. We invite you to be part of that moment — not as a peripheral sponsor, but as a co-architect of what comes next.
- Interdisciplinary Dialogue
- Global Leadership
- Action-Oriented
Conference Themes
Exploring 15 critical areas to reshape the mental health landscape through interdisciplinary collaboration.
Community Systems & PHC
Exploring the strategic shift from centralized, specialist-driven models toward decentralized, community-anchored systems where mental health is embedded into routine healthcare and everyday community life.
Digital Innovation & Technology
Examining how rapid advances in digital technology and scalable service delivery models are transforming access to mental health care — particularly in low-resource and underserved settings across Africa.
Financing & Policy
Exploring how mental health can be financed, sustained, and economically justified within broader health and development agendas — transforming mental health from a cost center into a high-impact investment.
Culture, Gender & Equity
Examining how mental health is understood, experienced, and addressed within diverse African settings — challenging universalized models in favor of culturally grounded, gender-responsive, and socially informed approaches.
Workforce & Capacity Building
Building, training, supervising, and sustaining a diverse mental health workforce capable of delivering safe, effective, and culturally responsive care at scale — from specialists to community-based lay providers.
Research & Evidence
Bridging the gap between evidence and impact — strengthening the science and practice of evidence generation, monitoring, evaluation, and implementation within community-based mental health systems.
Youth & Adolescent Mental Health
Strengthening mental health systems that support young people through schools, families, and community structures — emphasizing early intervention, resilience-building, and creating environments where youth can thrive.
Arts, Faith & Cultural Systems
Exploring how arts, faith, and cultural systems can be intentionally integrated into mental health promotion and care — honoring indigenous knowledge, spiritual resources, and creative expression as legitimate pathways to healing.
Social Cohesion & Belonging
Reframing social connection not merely as a desirable outcome but as a core mental health intervention — highlighting how relationships, belonging, and community cohesion prevent distress and support recovery.
Suicide Prevention & Crisis Response
Strengthening comprehensive, community-based suicide prevention and crisis response systems — shifting from reactive crisis management to proactive, preventive, and system-wide approaches that save lives.
Substance Use & Dual Diagnosis
Addressing substance use and addiction as part of a broader ecosystem involving mental health, social conditions, and structural vulnerabilities — emphasizing integrated, community-based prevention, treatment, and recovery.
Trauma, Violence & Human Rights
Centering the relationship between trauma, violence, and human rights — calling for trauma-informed systems of care that respond to psychological distress while addressing the underlying conditions that perpetuate harm.
Humanitarian MHPSS
Examining the mental health and psychosocial impact of conflict and displacement — highlighting the need for integrated, scalable, and culturally responsive MHPSS systems that support resilience, reintegration, and rebuilding.
Occupational Mental Health
Bringing attention to the psychological impact of working in high-pressure, ethically complex, and under-resourced environments — emphasizing system-level solutions that promote healthier, more supportive workplaces.
Prevention & Wellbeing
Exploring how mindfulness and broader wellbeing approaches can be integrated into community, school, workplace, and health systems to promote resilience, emotional regulation, and mental balance before distress escalates.
Cross-Cutting Priorities
Equity and Inclusion
Leaving no one behind in service delivery.
Ethics and Safeguarding
Upholding the highest standards of care and rights.
Policy Translation
Turning research into actionable national policies.
Community Ownership
Empowering locals to lead their own mental health programs.
Scalability & Sustainability
Models that grow and endure beyond pilot phases
Interdisciplinary Collaboration
Cross-sectoral partnerships for holistic health.
Strategic Impact
Paradigm Shift
Participate in redefining mental health from institutional-only to community- first care models.
Investment ROI
Explore the economic case for mental health and network with institutional donors.
Human-Centered
Contribute to design processes that put the lived experience of Africans at the core.
Policy Alignment
Directly contribute to the "Kampala Declaration" for future continental mental health policy.
Who Should Attend
Government Leaders
Researchers
NGOs
Practitioners
Donors
Private Sector
Students
And You