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Marianne de Reynier Nevsky, the cultural mediation manager in Neuchatel, left, and town council member Julie Courcier Delafontaine chat about a new "museum prescription" program outside the Ethnographic Museum of Neuchatel in Neuchatel, Switzerland. (AP)
The world's woes got you down? Feeling burnout at work? Need a little something extra to fight illness or prep for surgery? The Swiss town of Neuchatel is offering its residents a novel medical option: Expose yourself to art and get a doctor's note to do it for free. Under a two-year pilot project, authorities are covering the costs of "
museum prescriptions
" issued by doctors who believe their patients could benefit from visits to any of the town's four museums as part of their treatment.
The project is based on a 2019 WHO report that found arts can boost mental health, reduce the impact of trauma and lower risk of cognitive decline, frailty and "premature mortality," among other upsides. Art can help relax mind and visits to museums require getting up and out of house with physical activity like walking and standing for long periods.
Neuchatel council member Julie Courcier Delafontaine said the Covid crisis also played a role in the programme's genesis. "With clo- sure of cultural sites (during lockdowns), people realised just how much we need them to feel better." She said so far some 500 prescriptions have been distributed to doctors and the programme costs "very little." Ten thousand Swiss francs (about $11,300) have been budgeted for it.
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