A very silent mental health crisis

A new report suggests that Toronto is one of the loneliest cities in Canada.

How is this possible?

The Greater Toronto Area has a population of 6 million people. 6 million people! How could you possibly be alone?

The difference? The words alone and lonely are very different. Alone describes your physical state. Lonely describes your mental being, and feeling lonely can lead to more serious issues.

In my latest episode of The Mental Health Podcast, Loretta Karikari, a social worker with Ontario Shores Centre for Mental Health Sciences explains "when we are continuously feeling lonely, it could be a risk factor for depression, but then other physical health issues. Cancer, high blood pressure, diabetes and sometimes when you are lonely, you may be engaging in a lot more risky behaviour."

Even though loneliness is not recognized as a chronic mental health issue, perhaps it is time we started treating it as such. How serious is it?

• Recently you may have heard the U.S. Surgeon General say that loneliness has the same impact on your physical health as smoking 15 cigarettes a day. This is not hyperbole or alarmist. In fact this peer-reviewed finding was first revealed in 2017 by the American Psychological Association.
• The U.K. government now has a minister, Stuart Andrew, responsible for loneliness.
• Just this week, the World Health Organization declared loneliness a world health priority.

The domino effect of loneliness has even more serious implications on many serious issues we face as a society. Let's use crime as an example. Follow me here...loneliness can lead to depression. Depression and addiction are strongly linked. Of those who are before the courts for a crime, 70 percent have an addiction problem.

This, of course is worst case scenario, however, the same lines can be drawn to many other issues such as homelessness, heart disease, even the rise in radicalism. Again...worst case scenarios here but it underlines just how serious we need to take this seemingly innocuous thing called loneliness.

The great news is that there is a remedy. It costs nothing. It requires no medications. It only has good results. (how often have you heard that about any problem we face?)

I hope you will take some time to listen to my podcast which includes some great advice from Michael DiIororio who is a loneliness life coach.

Let's end off with sobering words from Mother Teresa.

Loneliness and the feeling of being unwanted is the most terrible poverty.