Loneliness is an epidemic. Here.
– 43% of senior citizens feel lonely
– loneliness leads to 45% greater risk of mortality
No.
80,000 people haven’t died of loneliness in the past 3 months.
Maybe. Maybe not.
If we include stress-induced heart conditions, and other effects then it may be as many.
No.
Excess deaths are not 160,000. Closer to 100,000.
And, many of those deaths were before the quarantine started.
But unlike COVID-19, one with far better availability of effective treatments.
Most loneliness sufferers can ameliorate their condition quite effectively and economically by calling someone on the phone or videocalling them on a computer, joining an online social group of some kind, connecting with people on social media, volunteering for an online or social-distanced project involving collaboration with others, spiritual practices such as meditation, and so on.
Also, anti-loneliness treatments can be provided by laypeople at little or no cost to themselves or the health care system.
Loneliness is not communicatable. By aerosoled droplets or surface contamination.
That doesn’t mean it’s not dangerous. In its own right.
My Brother at one time was in a deeply depressed state. His wife and me and my siblings all worked really hard to get him some help.
One night we were eating a restuarant together because he had been admitted to the hospital and put on suicide watch. The restaurant was sad. It was raining outside. We all were near tears.
So…you could debate we caught his depression.
We didn’t. We were suitably upset at the circumstances our brother had found himself in.
(He’s better now, btw)
COVID is cause by a virus. Depression is not.
Social distancing and other aspects of isolation could make an already depressed person sink lower.
It behooves you to combat sinking down in those dark places. Get your therapist on the phone. Reach out to family if you need help.
I’ve spent many hours alone in my adult life. I’ve been severely depressed. It takes a ‘fight’ to break out of that. And fought I did.
I learned to enjoy my own company.
It’s hard. I’m here to tell you, you can overcome.
Keep fighting the good fight.
But what percentage of seniors were lonely before the lockdown?
As one, I’m gonna say a similarly high number. So, a very silly OP I think.
If we move the goalposts, then…
Could you restate your argument in a complete, logical form?
But the most effective treatment for loneliness isn’t available right now.
No, you can probably still find hookers and blow.
:mad:
You probably thought that was funny, amirite?
Along the same lines, is it possible to estimate how many people would die in the next 2 years as a result of not just loneliness, but all other coronavirus/lockdown-related causes such as stress, depression, obesity, suicides, inability to afford healthcare due to job loss, cancers going untreated…?
e.g. the virus itself kills 200,000 by 2022, but medical complications from the lockdown resulted in another _______ people dying in that same time period.
I agree. I guess I have overstated my point in the OP.
Thanks for sharing. I hope he is OK now.
Loneliness and depression were here before the virus.
People live longer. Friends and family scatter to the 4 winds.
As luck (bad luck, maybe) my family was here helping me because I had my surgery. And now we are all quarantined together.
It’s been a job but also a great family time.
I feel particularly blessed because of this serendipitous outcome.
My kids and grandkids are here and safe.
Let me clear that up for you. Not.
The best cure for loneliness is simple insanity. Now I talk to folks like Cleopatra and Napoleon!
I guess in 2022 there will be people debating that, and probably along left v right lines, like everything else. IOW no you can’t count anything now that people care much about to nearly everyone’s satisfaction.
And it’s simplistic anyway: people suffer greatly from both COVID and the socio-economic fallout of ‘shut downs’, without dying. And while you can maybe come close to counting how many people really died from COVID (as opposed to an ‘excess death’ you’re inferring is from COVID, OTOH there might still be clear COVID deaths that just get missed) there’s nothing remotely like the same certainty of who died ‘from loneliness’ or psychological fallout of economic hard ship. That’s going to be ‘studies say’ and people are going to dispute it, again especially depending the politics of the people writing and quoting the study.
Here’s an interesting chart/analysis by the CDC estimating excess deaths from all causes.
Most of those deaths I assume are due to COVID-19.
There are around 40,000 suicides in the USA every year. I doubt that rate has shot up anywhere close to 40,000 per month.
Again, this sounds like an ill-conceived conservative hypothesis on “why we should ignore the Coronavirus”. It seems relatively easy to estimate “excess deaths” not captured by the deaths where COVID-19 was the documented cause. While I’m sure there has been an increase in other related deaths, the virus is the primary cause.
Also keep in mind that these measures are in place so that 70,000 deaths don’t become 700,000 or 7 million.