India’s mental health crisis is a silent epidemic that affects over 197 million people, with 70-90% of mental illnesses remaining untreated. Factors such as lack of awareness, deep-rooted stigma and a significant resource gap – with <1 psychiatrists, psychologists, and social workers per 100,000 people – contribute to the growing severity.

To address these challenges ACT partnered with AdagioVR in 2023 – an early-stage start-up making Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) therapy available to the vulnerable communities through virtual reality. The therapy program entails working with the user to  identify core target issues and delivering personalised VR sessions with facilitator support. With ACT’s support AdagioVR launched their first pilot in India, delivering EMDR therapy to 150 members of the transgender community in partnership with MITR Trust. The pilot helped validate the effectiveness of AdagioVR’s solutions with:

• A 93% reduction in depression/ stress levels and 90% reduction in trauma impact

• Unlocking a partnership with the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) for an ICMR-funded clinical study in leading hospitals in Delhi
• Onboarding various NGOs and Corporates as clients in B2B segment

Given such strong outcomes and traction, ACT For Health is excited to double down on AdagioVR with a follow-on grant to help them establish a product market fit for the Bharat audience through product testing on a diverse user cohort of 3-5K, and to enable them to experiment with pricing models to identify a revenue generation model viable for grassroots and government, while building a strong team. 

We look forward to partnering with AdagioVR in making quality and affordable mental healthcare accessible to Bharat!