The New Zealand arm of the global Men’s Health Week reports that 1 in 8 men will experience major depression in their lifetime, with the suicide rate being three times higher than that of women.   

Pacific people, historically, report high incidences of poor mental health, however have one of the lowest participation and engagement with mental and health services in addressing their mental well-being compared to other groups.   

“My experience of Pasifika men is that there’s been such a change in attitude across the entire community. And I think that for Pasifika men as well, we are shifting in terms of our own ability to talk about emotions, and the stigma associated with mental health. I think it's decreasing in all communities, including the Pacific community,” says Dr Foliaki.  

Dr Foliaki relays some of the positive movements that have taken place in this space and possible ways to enhance efforts in combatting the negative mental health statistics in Pasifika men.   

“I think the funding has been made available to improve the support, the number of people that are working in mental health and improving the quality of the service model. The money is available, but I think it needs better coordination, better organisation, and more trust in the actual communities to implement the things that work for them.  

“My hope is that is how it’s played out, that there are systems in place that allow local communities to organise themselves in a way that isn’t too driven by a central ideology and who are struggling right now.”  

The New Zealand Medical Journal reports the mortality rate between the ages of 50 and 70 as 30% higher than that of women, with the life expectancy for Māori and Pacific men being 73 years and 74.5 years, respectively, compared with 80.3 years for non-Māori males.   

Dr Foliaki offers some advice for Pasifika men in addressing their health.   

“There’s a lot of things you can do. Eat well, maintain good nutrition, regular exercises, all the wellbeing things we talk about. But from a Pacific worldview, the thing that makes us thrive the most are healthy relationships.  

“My advice to all men out there is to pay a little more attention to the quality of their relationships with the people that they love. I think that could go a long way towards helping them with their mental health.”   

Listen to Dr Foliaki's full interview with RNZ here.