Tag Archives: loneliness

ALMOST two years of restrictions helped stem the march of Covid-19, but it undoubtedly came at a cost to many people’s emotional and mental wellbeing. Loneliness was always one of the main reasons that people picked up the phone and rang the Samaritans, and with interaction virtually banned at certain times and severely restricted at all others, it was far worse than ever between March 2020 and January 2022. Margaret McMahon is director the Clare & Ennis branch of the Samaritans and on Monday, she said the pandemic had resulted in more callers. “I think we got more callers and they were coming from a wider range of backgrounds. We would have had students who were not back at home, young people who would have been staying away and there are all the pressures that come with that in a family.” “Particularly in the beginning there would have been people who were trying to keep a long distance relationship together. …

There is a largely unacknowledged silent killer of older people – and it’s called loneliness. A 2000 study by the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland found that more than eight times the number of older people living alone felt lonely compared to the general population. A European study has linked isolation to mental health problems, including depression and self-harm, (Eurostat 2011), and more recently, a UK survey found that social isolation among older people was associated with increased risk of death. Loneliness may be lethal and is currently affecting at least 25,000 older people in Ireland. This is the number of calls Senior Help Line – Ireland’s only national telephone listening service for older people – received last year. In most calls loneliness was either expressed or implied. On Thursday, the 25th anniversary of UN International Day of Older Persons, the Minister of State Kathleen Lynch will promote the value of contact between people of all ages by joining …