President Dr Mohamed Muizzu has announced that the Government will establish a dedicated mental health hospital in the Greater Malé Area, citing the rising prevalence of mental health conditions and the need for accessible, comprehensive treatment services. The announcement was made at a press briefing held at the President’s Office.
A Domestically Funded Facility
A mental health hospital project is currently underway in L. Gan with external financial assistance. Under a revised policy direction, the Government will additionally proceed with a separate, fully State-funded mental health hospital in the Greater Malé Area, with work to be expedited.
In the interim, existing healthcare facilities will be strengthened to ensure the continued provision of mental health services until the new hospital is operational.
The President also revealed that two pieces of legislation are being prepared for submission to the People’s Majlis: an Anti-Bullying Act, which would define bullying as a criminal offence and set out clear mechanisms for prevention and legal action against perpetrators, and a new Mental Health Bill. Targeted policies to address bullying in schools, educational institutions, healthcare facilities, and workplaces are also being developed.
Locating Services Where Demand Is Concentrated
Siting the new facility in the Greater Malé Area aligns service capacity with the country’s population distribution. The Greater Malé region is the demographic and economic centre of the Maldives, and its share of the national population has continued to grow.
According to the Maldives Population and Housing Census 2022, conducted by the Maldives Bureau of Statistics, 212,138 people now reside in the Greater Malé Area, comprising Malé, Hulhumalé, Villimalé, and Hulhulé. This represents approximately 41 percent of the country’s total resident population of 515,132, compared with 38 percent recorded in the 2014 census.
The original island of Malé — measuring just under 2 square kilometres — is among the most densely populated urban areas in the world, with population densities exceeding 65,000 people per square kilometre in its central wards.
Population Movement Toward the Capital Region
Internal migration data reflects a sustained movement of population toward the Greater Malé Area:
- The Household Income and Expenditure Survey (HIES) 2019 found that more than half of Malé’s resident population are migrants from other islands, and approximately 40 percent of all resident Maldivians have migrated at some point in their lives.
- The Census 2022 Migration Report recorded that Hulhumalé’s resident population grew at an annual rate of approximately 17 percent between 2014 and 2022, the fastest rate of any locality in the country.
- Hulhumalé alone now houses 65,724 residents, making it the largest inhabited island in the Greater Malé Area, while Maafannu ward in the capital holds another 46,928.
- The Maldives Population Projection 2014–2054 estimates that close to 64 percent of the resident Maldivian population will live in the Greater Malé Area by mid-century if current trends continue.
The principal drivers of this migration include access to higher education beyond Grade 10, employment opportunities, healthcare, and the broader concentration of services in the capital region.
Housing and Service Demand in the Greater Malé Area
Sustained population growth in the Greater Malé Area has been accompanied by significant demand for housing and supporting infrastructure. The Government’s allocation of approximately 7,000 social housing flats under the Hiyaa scheme in 2020 has been a major driver of the recent population shift to Hulhumalé, contributing directly to the rapid growth recorded there in the 2022 Census. Average household size in Malé sits at 4.5 persons.
Ongoing housing and urban development considerations in the Greater Malé Area include land availability and the use of reclaimed land for new residential development, the need for additional housing stock to match population inflows, continued investment in water, sanitation, and waste management capacity, and climate-resilience planning, with most islands sitting at an average elevation of approximately 1.6 metres above mean sea level.
These factors form part of the broader context in which health and social infrastructure planning takes place. International research has linked aspects of urban living — including density and housing conditions — with patterns of mental health service demand, which supports the case for placing dedicated facilities within the Greater Malé Area.
Mental Health Service Demand
Available data points to substantial and rising demand for mental health services in the Maldives:
- The 2003 Ministry of Health national mental health survey estimated that more than 10 percent of the population — around 30,000 people at the time — experienced common mental health problems, with 1 percent affected by psychotic disorders.
- The National Drug Use Survey 2011/2012 recorded drug use prevalence of 6.64 percent in Malé and 2.02 percent across the atolls. Among current drug users in Malé, around 15 percent had been diagnosed with a psychological disorder.
- The Global School-Based Student Health Survey found that 35.5 percent of students felt so sad or hopeless almost every day for two weeks or more in a 12-month period that they ceased usual activities.
- During the COVID-19 period, demand for mental health services in the Maldives more than doubled, with hospital consultations rising from 7,246 in 2019 to 17,708 in 2020.
The new hospital, together with the strengthening of existing facilities and the proposed legislative framework, is intended to expand the country’s overall capacity to respond to this demand.
Outlook
The combination of a dedicated mental health hospital in the Greater Malé Area, parallel capacity-building at existing healthcare facilities, and the proposed Anti-Bullying Act and Mental Health Bill represents a coordinated approach to mental health and related social policy. The package would, on enactment, provide the Maldives with a comprehensive statutory framework covering service provision, patient rights, and preventive measures in schools, workplaces, and other institutional settings.
For a population of just over half a million people, with around two-fifths now resident in the Greater Malé Area, the announced measures align infrastructure investment with the geographic distribution of demand.
