The Guardian on the importance of other people to your health and well-being.
Decades of research have proven that connection is as essential as food and water, but this knowledge hasn’t yet made its way into the mainstream understanding of health – and without it, we’re suffering..
Today, many people show signs of social health in decline. Over the past 30 years, the percentage of Americans with 10 or more close friends dropped by 20%. Over the past 20 years, the amount of time people spent alone increased by an average of 24 hours a month. Over the past 10 years, participation in communities, such as book clubs, sports leagues and neighborhood associations, fell by nearly 20%. And according to a national survey in 2019, about half of adults in the US felt as if no one knew them well.
The New York Times Magazine has some ideas about fixes (and the difficulty implementing them) here: Why Is the Lonliness Epidemic So Hard to Cure?