Opinion: 'Loneliness has become a social epidemic'

A commission established by Jo Cox before she was murdered has concluded that the UK should appoint a "minister for loneliness".

The Labour MP's sister, Kim Leadbeater, is helping launch the report - and in this opinion piece for Sky News, says loneliness has become a "social epidemic".

Chatting to strangers at the bus stop, inviting elderly aunties or uncles round for dinner, or sneaking to the neighbours for a sherry. Everyone gets more sociable at Christmas time.

And we all agree that no one should spend the day alone.

But for millions of people loneliness is something they face every day of the year.

Loneliness doesn't discriminate either. It affects people of all ages and from all backgrounds - from the school child who struggles to make friends, to the new parent coping alone, to the older person who has outlived friends and immediate family.

The evidence suggests that big life changes - such as moving home, changing schools, developing a health condition, becoming a carer, having a child, changing jobs or leaving work, experiencing family breakdown and bereavement - can all act as triggers for chronic loneliness.

Jo and I both knew this. Having been very close for all of our young lives, we both experienced loneliness the first time we were apart after Jo went away to university. It was a very difficult time for both of us. We were lucky enough to have support from our friends and family but the experience stayed with us both.

At the beginning of the year the Jo Cox Loneliness Commission was launched to carry forward my sister's determination to turbo-charge the national response on this issue. Jo felt strongly that loneliness was a great threat to our society and should be tackled as such.

Feelings of loneliness affect us all at some point, but being lonely is a problem when it becomes chronic - a day-to-day reality which, over time, can grind us down, affecting our health and wellbeing and damaging our ability to connect with others.

Loneliness has become a social epidemic. It can be a difficult thing to admit to feeling, yet almost one in five of all adults are often or always lonely.

As our society changes it can get tougher not easier. There are more pressures at home, at work and at school. We seem to have less time to meet together and get to know each other. And with the internet, if we're not careful we can judge too quickly, and find ourselves concentrating on what we disagree about and not what we have in common.

So we need to find new opportunities to grow and nurture links between individuals both online and in person, to create new communities across boundaries and borders, and to create space for people to connect on a human level.

The Commission's work has sought to start a conversation about how we can ensure that our future is more about meaningful connections, kindness and community, not isolation, separation and loneliness.

There are simple things we can all do straight away.

We need to check our relationship balances as often as we check our bank balances, and think about whether we've got the connections we need to keep us going.

We all need to think about the people in our families, neighbourhoods and wider communities who may be feeling isolated and lonely.

It's about day-to-day acts of kindness and making real, human connections with those around us.

In the last year we have seen a lot more awareness of the issue. Jo would have loved that. But she believed in action not words. So now it's up to all of us to play our part in continuing the work that she began on this important issue.