Loneliness goes from being an individual pain to becoming a public health hazard

 It torments the young and terrifies the old, etched deep in the soul of Emily Dickinson and left blind to William Blake.

Scientists consider today's loneliness - the scourge of humanity since time immemorial - as a major threat to public health. Scientists who have identified distinct links between loneliness and disease are tracing the precise biological mechanisms that make it dangerous down to deep molecular levels, and they have found that social isolation profoundly alters the human genome in the long run. 

Not only that, but the potential for damage from these genetic changes appears similar to the health risks of smoking, and even worse than diabetes and obesity, and scientists have concluded that loneliness can be life-threatening.  And the United States - which reveres individual values - has done little to alleviate the situation.

"In public health, we talk about obesity and smoking and all those things all the time, but we don't talk about lonely people and social isolation," said Christine Gerst Emerson, an assistant professor at the University of Georgia, Institute of Gerontology. .  Lonely people are dying, their health is weakening and they are costing society a lot more.

Psychologist Steve Cole - who studies the effect of social environment on genetic change - says researchers have known for years that lonely people are more likely to suffer from heart attacks, metastatic cancer, Alzheimer's and diabetes.  other diseases, "but we don't yet understand why.

Last year, Cole and his colleagues at the University of California School of Medicine, in collaboration with the University of California, Davis and the University of Chicago, discovered complex immune responses in action in people alone and found that social isolation increased activity.  genes responsible for inflammation and decreases the activity of genes responsible for disease Production of antibodies to fight infection.

A defect has been discovered in monocytes, a type of white blood cell that is produced in the bone marrow, as it changes dramatically in socially isolated people, and these monocytes play a specific immune role and are one of the first lines of defense of the body against infection.  , but immature monocytes cause infections and reduce the number of antibodies, where researchers found that these immature cells circulated abundantly in the blood of unattached individuals.

These cellular changes are a byproduct of human evolution, says John Cacioppo, professor of social neuroscience at the University of Chicago. Previously, when survival depended on cooperation and communication, social isolation was a major risk; So, evolution shaped the Neanderthal mind to demand and need social communication the same way evolution shaped the human mind to demand and need food. 

In this sense, the pain of loneliness is similar to the pain of hunger, it gives a biological signal that something is wrong, "When you are hungry, you may not realize that your blood sugar level blood is low, but as you drive, and if you see the golden arches of the McDonald's restaurant, it will alert you to your need for food,” says Cacioppo. 

Today, social isolation has often become an unavoidable way of life, but it puts the body and the cells on constant alert to any threat, which is why lonely people act negatively towards others.  This makes their ability to build relationships much more difficult.

"I see a lot of these patients all the time," says psychiatrist Jacqueline Olds, owner of a private practice in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and co-author of two books on the subject.  group, has a major psychological impact resulting from our evolving fears that everyone will survive but that we, the only ones, will not.

The most widely accepted definition of loneliness is when people feel helpless when they really fail to achieve their relationship goals. Feeling lonely is not the same as being lonely; Many people live in isolation, but they do not feel alone, on the contrary, your presence among others does not guarantee that you will not feel alone. 

Nor does loneliness mean depression, although they often go hand in hand; The first is a motivational feeling associated with the need for a sense of belonging, while the second is not a motivational feeling, but a more general feeling of sadness and hopelessness. 

At the University of Georgia, health economists Jenny Jayewardana and Grist wanted to know how widespread lonely distress really is. So they analyzed longitudinal data from two national health and retirement studies conducted in 2008 and 2012. From the responses of 7,060 people aged 60 and over, the researchers found: Chronic loneliness was a problem important public health concern and was related to disease progression and health care utilization.

These cellular changes are a byproduct of human evolution, says John Cacioppo, professor of social neuroscience at the University of Chicago. Previously, when survival depended on cooperation and communication, social isolation was a major risk; So, evolution shaped the Neanderthal mind to demand and need social communication the same way evolution shaped the human mind to demand and need food. 

In this sense, the pain of loneliness is similar to the pain of hunger, it gives a biological signal that something is wrong, "When you are hungry, you may not realize that your blood sugar level blood is low, but as you drive, and if you see the golden arches of the McDonald's restaurant, it will alert you to your need for food,” says Cacioppo. 

Today, social isolation has often become an unavoidable way of life, but it puts the body and the cells on constant alert to any threat, which is why lonely people act negatively towards others.  This makes their ability to build relationships much more difficult.

"I see a lot of these patients all the time," says psychiatrist Jacqueline Olds, owner of a private practice in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and co-author of two books on the subject.  group, has a major psychological impact resulting from our evolving fears that everyone will survive but that we, the only ones, will not.

The most widely accepted definition of loneliness is when people feel helpless when they really fail to achieve their relationship goals. Feeling lonely is not the same as being lonely; Many people live in isolation, but they do not feel alone, on the contrary, your presence among others does not guarantee that you will not feel alone. 

Nor does loneliness mean depression, although they often go hand in hand; The first is a motivational feeling associated with the need for a sense of belonging, while the second is not a motivational feeling, but a more general feeling of sadness and hopelessness. 

At the University of Georgia, health economists Jenny Jayewardana and Grist wanted to know how widespread lonely distress really is. So they analyzed longitudinal data from two national health and retirement studies conducted in 2008 and 2012. From the responses of 7,060 people aged 60 and over, the researchers found: Chronic loneliness was a problem important public health concern and was related to disease progression and health care utilization.