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Mental and behavioral disorders are an important public health problem and constitute a priority for the WHO, whose recommendations include the surveillance of their risk factors. On the other hand, drought episodes have been increasing in frequency and severity in Europe since 1980. Therefore, to review the present knowledge about the impact of drought on mental and behavioral disorders, in the present climate change context, and to underline potential research gaps, could be of major interest. Thus, we performed a narrative review using online academic databases with the aim of identifying relevant literature about the impact of drought on mental and behavioral disorders. To the best of our knowledge, no study in Europe quantifies the potential association between drought and mental disorders. A limited number of studies have found significant associations between droughts (with different temporal ranges) and various measures of mental health. However, according to our review, only three of them quantified the association between drought and objective mental health outcomes, such as number of emergencies due to clinically diagnosed mental disorders or suicides. Additionally, few studies used specific indices as a measure of drought; and finally, as far as authors are aware, none of them has analyzed this relationship adjusting for various other potential environmental confounders. Moreover, the eventual association could vary between different geographical areas within the same country. Therefore, national and regional studies would be especially necessary. Thus, there is a need for specific national and regional studies, in Europe and globally, that assess the impact of specific indices of drought (with different temporal ranges) on objective mental health outcomes controlling for potential environmental confounders. Moreover, the quantification of its cost would be necessary for health prioritization, evidence-based policies and strategic health planning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The European Union (EU) faces many health-related challenges. Burden of diseases information and the resulting trends over time are essential for health planning. This paper reports estimates of disease burden in the EU and individual 27 EU countries in 2019, and compares them with those in 2010. Methods: We used the Global Burden of Disease 2019 study estimates and 95% uncertainty intervals for the whole EU and each country to evaluate age-standardised death, years of life lost (YLLs), years lived with disability (YLDs) and disability-adjusted life years (DALYs) rates for Level 2 causes, as well as life expectancy and healthy life expectancy (HALE). Results: In 2019, the age-standardised death and DALY rates in the EU were 465.8 deaths and 20,251.0 DALYs per 100,000 inhabitants, respectively. Between 2010 and 2019, there were significant decreases in age-standardised death and YLL rates across EU countries. However, YLD rates remained mainly unchanged. The largest decreases in age-standardised DALY rates were observed for "HIV/AIDS and sexually transmitted diseases" and "transport injuries" (each -19%). "Diabetes and kidney diseases" showed a significant increase for age-standardised DALY rates across the EU (3.5%). In addition, "mental disorders" showed an increasing age-standardised YLL rate (14.5%). Conclusions: There was a clear trend towards improvement in the overall health status of the EU but with differences between countries. EU health policymakers need to address the burden of diseases, paying specific attention to causes such as mental disorders. There are many opportunities for mutual learning among otherwise similar countries with different patterns of disease. Key-points: • This article, systematically analysing GBD 2019 study estimates, presents an overview of the state of health in the European Union in 2019, compared to 2010. • There was an improvement in the overall health status of the EU, despite substantial differences between Member States. • Cardiovascular diseases and neoplasms are the major contributors to the overall burden of diseases in the EU in 2019. • The age-standardised rate of years lived with disability due to mental disorders has been increasing and is expected to increase even more because of the COVID-19 pandemic. • This report provides a framework upon which to base further region- and country-specific health policies and interventions, to support health planning and priority setting. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]