How will a ministry of loneliness help?

Japan’s Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga, announced the addition of a Minister of Loneliness to his cabinet last month, closely following a similar announcement in January 2018 by the United Kingdom (UK). Loneliness, as a societal malaise, is rarely acknowledged. Which is why it is heartening to see that it is finding a prominent place on governmental agenda.

Work from home (WFH), telework, remote work and the visible absence of social contact and social get-togethers in the past year have left people across the globe feeling increasingly stressed and lonely. Japan, as a country has actively taken notice of this citizen predicament and recognised the pain. Pandemic-linked isolation has been identified as the main reason for the first uptick in Japanese suicides in 11 years. Tetsushi Sakamoto, the new minister in Tokyo, will work across multiple ministries and agencies to bring some cheer into the lives of the lonely.

“Women especially are feeling more isolated and face increasing suicide rates,” Suga san signaled to minister Sakamoto, while appointing him to his new job. The minister is already up and about, addressing his not-so-easy task with much conviction and commitment. Sakamoto san wrote on his homepage recently that the UK, which appointed a designated loneliness minister in 2018, has an isolation problem with its older people. In Japan, on the other hand, loneliness afflicts across different age groups, including children, young people, women and older people. There is, therefore, a need for thorough research into both the causes as well as likely controls for loneliness.

Statistics from the UK show that 33 per cent people accept that they are lonely. In the United States, the number is close to 50 per cent. The Longitudinal Ageing Study of India conducted recently under the aegis of The National Programme for Health Care of Elderly and the National Institute on Ageing says that approximately 23 per cent of the elderly in India stay alone, without children. But the study does not shed much light on the subject of loneliness. 

Nevertheless, a separate research report would have us believe that out of a sample size of 15,000 respondents, 47.5 per cent of elderly people reported being lonely. In terms of specific loneliness symptoms, lack of companionship was reported by 62.5 per cent, feeling of being left out in life was reported by 58.7 per cent, and 56.5 per cent of the individuals reportedly felt isolated from others. More severe loneliness was associated with a higher severity of depression, anxiety, and somatic symptoms. So, in India, the problem of loneliness is no less severe.

What is loneliness? Loneliness is “the discrepancy between an individual’s desired and achieved levels of social relationships”. A related term to loneliness is social isolation. Social isolation is an actually quantifiable shortfall in the social relationships of a person, which can be measured in the form of size of the social network of the person and frequency of contacts. In a way, social isolation indicates quantitative isolation, whereas loneliness is more of qualitative isolation. In India, and elsewhere, both loneliness and social isolation are becoming bigger and bigger problems.

Experts categorise loneliness into three types based on its causation. The three types of loneliness include situational loneliness, developmental loneliness, and internal loneliness. Situational loneliness is said to arise due to socioeconomic and cultural factors, such as migration, interpersonal conflicts, accidents, and disasters. Developmental loneliness is thought to be an outcome of discrepancy in the need for individualism and desire for intimacy. Internal loneliness is understood as an internal perception of being alone, which is often fuelled by low self-esteem, low self-worth, and poor coping with the adverse situations. Internal loneliness is believed to be the biggest trigger for depression, leading to suicide.

Can creating a ministry help cure this societal malaise? Perhaps not. Governments can create programmes, catalyse help-groups, allocate budgets but the actual healing touch or in this case the comforting hug has to come from society … from families, from friends, from neighbours, from acquaintances, from co-workers … to combat the void created by “the sad reality of modern life”, as Prime Minister Theresa May put it when appointing Tracey Crouch as the first minister charged with addressing loneliness in the UK. Governments can provide funds; they can create an enabling system of help and self-help. But governmental interventions alone cannot repair the frayed fabric of society.

In Japan, lonely deaths among the elderly have a name, Kodokushi. In the UK, the creation of a ministry was a sequel to the Jo Cox Commission on Loneliness, which looked for “the safety net that wasn’t there to stop that descent (into loneliness).” But research in the UK also shows that 16 to 24 year-olds reported feeling more lonely than pensioners between the ages of 65 and 74. Technology, like the internet, which is seen as a source of isolation for young people, can be a solution for the older generation, keeping them connected with family, and therefore cuts both ways.

The writer is an advertising and media veteran