data from england show a premature mortality rate among people with severe mental illness that is threefold higher compared with the general population in australia a life expectancy gap of almost years for males and years for females has been observed oecd a this excess mortality is due to a complex combination of factors related to mental diagnosis and psychopathology adverse side effects of psychotropic medication lifestyle and health behaviours professional attitudes and roles and health system organisation and funding oecd a japan would do well to explore the extent to which such health outcome and life expectancy differentials exist amongst the japanese population with severe mental illness the oecd reports on excess mortality for schizophrenia and bipolar disorder but japan is not yet submitting data for this indicator due to the lack of regular data linkage as discussed in chapter action is needed in order to properly address these disparities