Loneliness can cause the same damage to health as smoking

Researchers at the University of Sheffield-Hallam in England have found a strange thing: Loneliness and social isolation are just as harmful as smoking.

Vivek Murthy, US Surgeon General, emphasizes that “social alienation” has the same effect as death caused by smoking up to 15 cigarettes a day. This statement was widely covered in the media, including the Washington Post, Times and Daily Mail.

Dr. Murthy referred to a study published in 2010 in which studied social relations and mortality rates. The researchers pooled data from 148 studies on the topic in a so-called “meta-analysis” to get a broader statistical answer to their questions. The meta-analysis contained data on 300,000 participants in the study for an average of seven and a half years.

The researchers are Andrea Wigfield, Professor of Applied Social and Political Studies, Director of the Center for Loneliness Studies at the University of Sheffield-Hallam, Jan Gurung, Researcher at the Center for Loneliness Studies at the University of Sheffield-Hallam, and Laura Mackay, PhD at the University of Sheffield-Hallam, studying the extent to which social relationships may affect the risk of premature death, aspects of social relationships and any risk-reducing factors concluded that single people are 50% more likely to die prematurely than those who are in a relationship.

The above conclusion was made using a statistical tool called a “random effects model” that assessed the impact of social relationships on death and how this was related to common risk factors for early death such as cigarette smoking.

The methodology used by the researchers showed that loneliness is definitely unhealthy and can be “equivalent to the effects of smoking 15 cigarettes a day”.

The researchers also noted that the health effects of loneliness are similar to drinking alcohol (more than six drinks a day) and outweigh other risk factors such as physical inactivity and obesity. Comparisons with smoking can also increase the burden of loneliness and exacerbate the stigma associated with loneliness. However, the effectiveness of the analogy cannot be underestimated. Thirteen years later, the paper continues to raise awareness of loneliness and its associated harmful health effects.

Other studies have also noted a number of diseases associated with loneliness and social isolation, including heart disease and stroke, type 2 diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis and cancer. Isolation can jeopardize even recovery after heart surgery. Various mental health conditions can also be caused by loneliness, including hopelessness, depression, sleep problems, alcohol abuse, and other psychiatric disorders.

Lonely people also have an increased sensitivity to social threat. They believe that loneliness has an evolutionary nature (as a function), which is felt in the same way as hunger or thirst, and is a signal for people to change their lifestyle and social relations.

However, when loneliness becomes chronic, people express their negative emotions in different ways and unwittingly provoke various health conditions.

Loneliness is also associated with an increased risk of dementia. In addition, a separate study was conducted examining how the pandemic increased the level of loneliness of people in society. During the pandemic, the number of people experiencing loneliness has increased dramatically, including young people. The pandemic has also accelerated social transformations such as telecommuting and online shopping that exacerbated levels of loneliness.

The problem of dealing with loneliness is further exacerbated by the cost to health care, business and the economy. The annual cost of loneliness to the UK economy and UK private sector employers could be as high as £32bn and £2.5bn respectively.

Thus, the professors-authors of the study came to the conclusion that Dr. Murthy is right, and that loneliness can indeed be as harmful to health as smoking.

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