At a time when nationalism has reappeared in Europe, when COVID-19 is not yet quarantined and when compassion coexists with grief, there is a need to consider the impact of these societal changes on international collaboration, frequency and management of perinatal mental disorder – and new roles for psychiatrists and other health professionals in the digital and AI (artificial intelligence) post-COVID era.

China's healthcare is improving together with rapid economic growth. Yet, mental healthcare is lagging behind. Prevalence of perinatal depression is high among women of the one-child generation, but access to qualified care is limited. Chinese healthcare professionals, policy makers and patients alike express concerns about insufficient knowledge among the public as well as healthcare providers regarding mental disorders. There appears to be a general lack of help-seeking behaviour for mental disorders owing to perceived risk of social stigmatisation. Social support through family and friends, use of online resources and community healthcare services are preferred, rather than seeking help from mental health specialists.

France has a long tradition of concern for maternal and perinatal mental health. However, the national organisation of psychiatric care does not yet provide structured guidelines on the organisation of perinatal psychiatric care. This paper provides an update on existing resources and their linkage to primary care and obstetric and paediatric services, as well as a review of current and future national priorities that are under development.

Africa is a diverse and changing continent with a rapidly growing population, and the mental health of mothers is a key health priority. Recent studies have shown that: perinatal common mental disorders (depression and anxiety) are at least as prevalent in Africa as in high-income and other low- and middle-income regions; key risk factors include intimate partner violence, food insecurity and physical illness; and poor maternal mental health is associated with impairment of infant health and development. Psychological interventions can be integrated into routine maternal and child healthcare in the African context, although the optimal model and intensity of intervention remain unclear and are likely to vary across settings. Future priorities include: extension of research to include neglected psychiatric conditions; large-scale mixed-method studies of the causes and consequences of perinatal common mental disorders; scaling up of locally appropriate evidence-based interventions, including prevention; and advocacy for the right of all women in Africa to safe holistic maternity care.

Our attributes change. Sometimes they are changed so dramatically (for instance by organic brain disease, traumatic brain injury or psychiatric disease) that it is hard to see any significant continuity with the premorbid person. Sometimes this can have important ethical and legal consequences, but the problems are often ignored. This article highlights some of the difficulties.

This paper describes a condition termed post-flight confusion using anecdotal and clinical observations. It reviews research from the fields of aviation and altitude medicine and how this could apply to some physiological changes that happen during commercial flights. The collection of symptoms observed is similar to those of delirium. More research is needed to validate these observations, to identify the risks of flying for older people and to consider not only how to minimise these risks but whether this situation contributes to our knowledge about the aetiologies of delirium and dementias.

This paper outlines the importance of person-centred approaches to the practice of contemporary medicine and psychiatry. In considering the many aspects of person-centred approaches it outlines some key perspectives, including freedom and human rights; improving individual practice and the quality of services; increasing clinicians’ work satisfaction; combining value-based and evidence-based practice; and the training of future generations of psychiatrists.

This article is a summary of perspectives on training curricula from child and adolescent psychiatry trainees globally. We aimed to identify the relative strengths, weaknesses and gaps in learning needs from a trainee's perspective. The 20 early-career child psychiatrists who contributed are from 16 countries and represent all the five continents. We could identify some global challenges as well as local/regional challenges that need to be addressed to develop competent child psychiatrists.