Loneliness: The silent epidemic sweeping through Britain

By: Rosemary Bennett and Mary Bowers | Times Online.com

"When Joyce Heaton began to feel restless and low just before Christmas last year she wasn’t sure what was wrong with her.

“Something happened last winter and it just crept over me,” she said. “I couldn’t sleep. I just sat in a chair waiting for daylight to come. I was in a terrible state. I just felt that there was nobody there and I thought ‘I can’t go on like this’.”

Eventually Mrs Heaton, 81, visited her doctor in Huddersfield. “He was very busy,” she said, “but they asked me to see the practice nurse, and she said it was loneliness.” The nurse put Mrs Heaton in touch with WRVS (the former Women’s Royal Voluntary Service) and she began to receive visits from Amanda Hall, 39, a local volunteer who is now a regular visitor.

For many older people the problem of loneliness is not so easily solved. In fact, loneliness is reaching nearepidemic proportions among the over-65s. According to research by Age Concern, more than one in ten say that they always — or often — feel lonely. Almost half consider television their main form of company and half a million spent Christmas Day alone.

The sharp decline in local services has hit the elderly hard. More than 2,500 post offices have closed, 5,000 small shops have disappeared in the past six years and pubs are closing at the rate of 27 a week.

The digital revolution, which could offer a lifeline to elderly people by helping them to stay in touch with each other, has left many of them behind. The latest official data found that only 17 per cent of those over 65 go online, and only half of those over 50 have access to the web.

More and more people are dying alone, without family or friends willing or able to pay for their burial and leaving local authorities to pick up a bill of £1,000 or more. A snapshot survey of 116 councils by the Local Government Association found that 4,900 “paupers’ funerals” took place in England and Wales in 2007-8, an increase of 10 per cent on the year before.

Mervyn Kohler, head of policy at Age Concern/Help the Aged, said that loneliness is not an inevitable part of old age, but that it was more likely to affect the elderly because of bereavement, ill health and poverty.

“The starting point is the growing number living alone, often following a bereavement. That takes you into the area of risk of isolation, and that in turn can lead to the downward spiral of not looking after yourself properly, then excluding yourself from events and experiences which present opportunities for friendship,” he said.

“That can lead to a lowering of self-esteem, then depression and medical problems arising from that. The elderly have been particularly hit by diminishing local services. In the past, a trip out to buy a newspaper from the corner shop or visit the post office or pub was the reason to make an effort, to dress nicely, so it is very worrying that, for many, that reason has gone.”

Ted Aylward, 87, knew that he was at risk of going into a decline when his wife Ivy died 13 years go after suffering Alzheimer’s disease. They had done everything together and the last few years of her illness had been particularly difficult for him. When Ivy was alive he went once or twice to the Reminiscence Centre in Blackheath, South London, which encourages older people through art and drama to talk about their memories and link up with the younger generation through school visits. Becoming a volunteer has been a lifeline, he says.

He now does a weekly school visit to talk about what Britain was like during the Second World War.

“I really love acting out the evacuation for the children. I do a little play where I am a farmer meeting them off the train from London. I tell them all the jobs I’ll be expecting them to do, and check their hair for nits and their arms to see how big their muscles are. They think its all really funny. It’s great to meet so many young people and have fun with them.”

Sir Ian Mills, chairman of the charity Age Exchange, which runs the centre in Blackheath, believes that such initiatives can bring a huge improvement in the quality of life for older people. “Some may just come for a cup of tea, others to volunteer. But what we do significantly improves the quality of life for those over 60,” he said.

Contact the Elderly is a national organisation that provides services for the very elderly who live alone. For many people aged over 75, according to the director Roderick Syme, a lack of friends, family and carers is only part of their loss. “As people get older other things happen,” he says. “Their hearing goes and their sight goes. All these things we take for granted that entertain us — television, books — go. And they become less able to take care of themselves. They can spend very many hours and days alone staring at those four rather boring walls.”

Contact the Elderly runs a scheme in which volunteers organise afternoon tea every month and drive elderly people to their homes. “It becomes what people remember Sunday afternoons being when they were young and had families,” he said. “These groups become a meeting of friends.”

Never has there been more demand for such services. The most recent figures from the Office for National Statistics show that there are 7.5 million people — half of pensionable age — living alone compared with 4.3 million 15 years ago.

Mr Kohler said that potentially there was an abundance of services for the elderly.

He said: “The first person in a position to pick up the warning signs of loneliness is the GP. If we had a good referral system, people at risk could be directed to the right services before severe problems start. We just don’t have early intervention and connection between the public services to make sure, for example, adequate transport is available to get people around.”"

Read the full article.