Comedian Jo Brand was awarded an honorary doctorate on Tuesday from Birmingham City University as hundreds graduated from the University’s Faculty of Health, Education and Life Sciences. The doctorate was in recognition of her work raising awareness of mental illness.
Before her comedy career Jo Brand was a mental health nurse and since leaving the profession in pursuit of comedy has continued to campaign for a range of charities in the sector. Jo said: “I think one of the problems around mental health is, it is in reality a lack of funding and I’m not blaming that on anyone in particular.
“I also couple that with the stigma that still exists around mental health which is that people are still ashamed to talk about it and to admit it.
“So I think the more we can bring it out in the open the better and then hopefully governments will recognise the importance of funding it in the way that other services are funded as well.”
Jo joked that: “Obviously to get a doctorate and be able to swan around and annoy people that are much more intelligent than me is really great.
“I think it’s absolutely essential that we keep providing new nurses. And what I would say to new nurses is, don’t forget the actual nursing component.
“Because I think when you have a degree and you are very skilled and have the knowledge of nursing it’s very easy to forget that you also need to be a kind person and you also need to do the not so glamorous stuff as well.”
Congratulations Doctor Jo Brand!
