Loneliness

'All the lonely people
Where do they all come from
All the lonely people
Where do they all belong?'      Stanza from Beatles song Eleanor Rigby

According to the article below, 'They’re the outsiders: not just the elderly, but also the poor, the bullied, the different. Surveys confirm that people who feel discriminated against are more likely to feel lonely than those who don’t.'...'A key part of feeling lonely is feeling rejected, and that, it turns out, is the most damaging part.'

Read an intelligent article on the effects of Loneliness on Human Beings:  http://www.newrepublic.com/article/113176/science-loneliness-how-isolation-can-kill-you#

"we’ve known intuitively that loneliness hastens death, but haven’t been able to explain how. Psychobiologists can now show that loneliness sends misleading hormonal signals, rejiggers the molecules on genes that govern behavior, and wrenches a slew of other systems out of whack. They have proved that long-lasting loneliness not only makes you sick; it can kill you. Emotional isolation is ranked as high a risk factor for mortality as smoking."

"Loneliness, ....—and this will surprise no one—is the want of intimacy."

The article went on to say that this is becoming a Public health crisis -- with a third of Americans reporting they don't feel close to anyone at a given time. The numbers growing from 1 in 5 to 1 in 3 from 10 yrs ago to now.

I felt pleased with myself when I read one of the researchers presumably back in the early '80s, thinking of imagining the world from a gay man's perspective, that I recognised a qualitative study -- considering the subject's point of view.

'If we now know that loneliness, a social emotion, can reach into our bodies and rearrange our cells and genes, what should we do about it? We should change the way we think about health. James Heckman, a Nobel Prize–winning economist at the University of Chicago who tabulates the costs of early childhood deprivation, speaks bitterly of “silos” in health policy, meaning that we see crime and low educational achievement as distinct from medical problems like obesity or heart disease. As far as he’s concerned, these are, in too many cases, symptoms of the same social disorder: the failure to help families raise their children.'

'As nearly half of all marriages continue to end in divorce, as marriage itself floats further out of reach for the undereducated and financially strapped, childhood has become a more solitary and chaotic experience. Single mothers don’t have a lot of time to spend with their children, nor, in most cases, money for emotionally enriching social activities.

“As inequality has increased, childhood inequality has increased,” Heckman said, “So has inequality of parenting.”

The article mentioned that depression- set to become the largest Public Health disease in the future - may be a symptom of Loneliness but is not the cause  (http://gtobserver.blogspot.com/2011/11/depression.html)  but ended on a positive note that we can be masters of our fate and change the outcomes with a deterministic attitude. 

UPDATE 25-Nov-1013: Canada too:  http://m.theglobeandmail.com/life/life-of-solitude-a-loneliness-crisis-is-looming/article15573187/?service=mobile