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Loneliness a 'bigger health risk than smoking or obesity'

bbc.co.uk

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Re: Loneliness a 'bigger health risk than smoking or obesity'

#21

Post by toomanybeersies »

tut-urut-utut wrote: post #4

It's known since the humanity exists that humans are social creatures, yet we as a society don't do anything to promote social interaction between people. Actually, we are actively suppressing real social contact due to the way our society is set up. - "State / faceless institution" organized social security, reducing the need of social network / safety net. - The rise of "social media" leading to less social interac…

What's your proposed solution? Cut everyones working hours, abolish social welfare, and make everyone poor so they need to rely on their extended family?

Re: Loneliness a 'bigger health risk than smoking or obesity'

#23

Post by wombatmobile »

I used to feel lonesome all the time.

Then I bought myself a book about narcissism, and a dozen floor to ceiling mirrors.

Now I stay at home every night, reading stories i've written about myself out loud from my diary, and taking selfies.

I feel like the luckiest person in the world.

I'm awesome ;-D

Re: Loneliness a 'bigger health risk than smoking or obesity'

#25

Post by FeistySkink »

carlmr wrote: post #15
FeistySkink wrote: post #2

I lost all of my social network during 2020. Being almost 40 and with the current situation still in progress, I don't even know where to start. I have no social contact outside of remote work and some sport activities.

How did that happen? My friend circle reduced a lot due to my countries restrictions. You could only meet one person, so it was often the same people that paired up. I guess a lot of people were left out of that. I'm very grateful I had an SO and two good friends I could often meet up with.

Looks like most connections were pretty shallow to begin with. And I moved to another country just to make things easier for myself.

Re: Loneliness a 'bigger health risk than smoking or obesity'

#26

Post by mkr-hn »

raxxorrax wrote: post #10

My impression was that more and more people withdraw because the "public" has become quite toxic.

There's definitely an element of the last several years revealing how many people are just awful human beings. I'm wary of spending time getting to know someone only to find out they think certain people (like me) don't deserve equal rights, or something like that.

I know on some level people were always like that. Bad ideas are pervasive and always have been. But there's more echo chambers reinforcing bad ideas now. There was some hope in the past of maybe changing someone's mind. Now they get it reinforced constantly with push notifications and digests. High speed, personalized media both revealed it and made it harder to change.

Re: Loneliness a 'bigger health risk than smoking or obesity'

#27

Post by weavie »

asdev wrote: post #18
weavie wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This could do with a sign up so I can get a reminder when it launches. I am guaranteed to forget about it by then otherwise.

do you think email sign up would be preferrable? I was thinking it's better to get people to follow the Instagram account so I can reach them when I launch

Personally, I will never use Instagram.

Re: Loneliness a 'bigger health risk than smoking or obesity'

#28

Post by IMTDb »

tokai wrote: post #12
camillomiller wrote: post #3

>One woman who felt isolated in lockdown said loneliness was now a bigger health risk than smoking or obesity. So, this is the source of the article. No reference to any single study, despite all the research available on the topic. What a piece of anecdotical crap this article is. >Pre-pandemic, the Royal College of General Practitioners Wales called for all practices to have their own social prescriber in a bid to…

It is stated in the article. The first voxpop is from a Mind Cymru project. They are a Welsh non-profit working with mental health. The other one from Royal College of General Practitioners Wales. You can find their oppinion here[0] and the study with the specific 50% figure here[1]. I think you are overselling how little information is provided. Taking in account the venue and audience it is still easy to look up mo…

You might argue that a non-profit organisation that describes itself as "[...] an unstoppable community of people in Wales who won't give up [...]" (See: https://www.mind.org.uk/about-us/mind-cymru/) might not be the most neutral entity that can produce non biased studies/data.

I do believe in their cause, and "raising awareness" usually is a major mission for these orgs. But "raising awareness" is a marketing/communication/political process, that is incompatible with scientific rigour.

Re: Loneliness a 'bigger health risk than smoking or obesity'

#29

Post by dannyw »

asdev wrote: post #18
weavie wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This could do with a sign up so I can get a reminder when it launches. I am guaranteed to forget about it by then otherwise.

do you think email sign up would be preferrable? I was thinking it's better to get people to follow the Instagram account so I can reach them when I launch

Platforms like Instagram don't give you organic reach to all followers.

Re: Loneliness a 'bigger health risk than smoking or obesity'

#30

Post by minikites »

tut-urut-utut wrote: post #4

It's known since the humanity exists that humans are social creatures, yet we as a society don't do anything to promote social interaction between people. Actually, we are actively suppressing real social contact due to the way our society is set up. - "State / faceless institution" organized social security, reducing the need of social network / safety net. - The rise of "social media" leading to less social interac…

>"State organized" social security, reducing the need of social network / safety net.

Before this, people just died. Hard to be lonely when you're dead.

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