My neighbours and I were left without water for four days during a pandemic – as PFI means no one took responsibility, says mental health writer Clare Allan

The government’s strategy ignores the complex causes of obesity, so it will fail. But there is an answer, says author Clare Allan

The yoghurt from the Turkish shop, the bread from the Polish deli: delivering shopping at this time is full of small preferences, says author Clare Allan

Assuming Trump is a ‘nutter’ is a dangerous road. When politics and psychiatry meet, it’s often for nefarious ends

Tory cuts to mental health services have led to increased use of the act to detain people every year since 2007

The invisible nature of mental health problems underlies the discrimination many people face – and makes it easier to cut their benefits

Theresa May is right – there is a ‘hidden injustice’ in young people’s mental health, but it’s one that has been exacerbated by this government

It will simply foster division and prejudice, without tackling the roots of the problems

Ken Loach’s drama exposed the tragic mental health consequences of homelessness, but half a century on the problems and failures are increasing

If it’s hard in writing fiction to get inside another person’s point of view, it’s much harder in real life – but it’s essential in this post-referendum turmoil

The rising number of people with severe mental health problems in the Netherlands who are ending their lives under Dutch euthanasia laws is deeply disturbing

The UK’s disability benefits system – like the church in Bruegel’s painting of the blind leading the blind – is divorced from the needs of those it is meant to help

I choose to speak out when I hear people misusing epithets such as psycho and nutter. This doesn’t make me a po-faced party pooper – language shapes attitudes

Divorcing mental ill health from its social and political context, as the BBC’s recent In the Mind Series did, implies wider issues of inequality or poverty don’t matter

All my life I have found myself in situations where I have passively allowed someone to take advantage of me. But not any more

People looking for a new year boost buy into the transformational message of food supplements – it’s easier than believing that we can change ourselves

It’s not over-sensitive to be angry about Livingstone’s comments about fellow MP Kevan Jones. These kind of statements have real, human consequences

The relationship between me and my dog, Meg, has been characterised by hope, hers in me and mine in her

More vulnerable people, like Michael O’Sullivan, will die if the Department for Work and Pensions does not row back on its work capability assessments

A radio documentary about my beloved Uncle Pad shows how easily ‘normal’ drinking can escalate in response to the stresses that come with ageing