Ruby Wax to be awarded OBE for mental health work

Wax has campaigned for mental health awareness

Broadcaster and campaigner Ruby Wax will be awarded an OBE for her services to mental health.

Wax has written a best-selling book called Sane New World and starred in a theatre show of the same name.

She is also patron for the British Neuroscience Association and supports mental health charities.

Wax is best-known for fronting TV documentaries and interviews as well as script editing the hugely successful Absolutely Fabulous.

'Wisdom and humour'

Her OBE will be an honorary British award for foreign nationals.

She started her career as an actress, including time with the Royal Shakespeare Company.

Having experienced clinical depression herself, Wax studied for a Masters degree in mindfulness-based cognitive therapy from the University of Oxford in 2013.

Her mental health work has included speaking at Downing Street to raise money for neuroscience research.

Mark Williams, professor of clinical psychology at the University of Oxford, said: "Ruby's campaigning reveals her rare skill of being able to speak of the deepest and most painful things with openness, wisdom and humour, bringing acute observations and fresh perspectives to a field that badly needs them."