A national effort could help the elderly deal with the loss of social contact

Marian Teague says her husband Jim had previously done talks on living with dementia, but had since lost the ability to communicate. This, she believes, is because he had no-one with whom to connect.

It is an upsetting story to which most people can relate. The number of people living with age related dementia or Alzheimer’s in rich countries has been rising relentlessly.

The miracle of modern medicine that has meant many people living far longer than people used to do has a downside — an increase in the complications that old people suffer.

Lockdown has caused elderly people of sound mind to deteriorate, let alone people whose mental faculties were declining. The situation is all the more worrying because there is no easy solution. If older people spend time around the young, many of them might become infected and die.

Yet isolation leads to loneliness and even despair. Plenty of older people feel, reasonably enough, that they have the right to put themselves at risk, and would prefer to stay active and take their chances. But the risk of that is very real.

If society lets people and businesses operate with low restrictions, particularly young people given the tiny risk to them, then it should cost the state less financially.

Much of that saved money should be allocated to helping relatives financially in the extra burden they face of looking after vulnerable. And, perhaps, to teams of support workers who can befriend those who are isolated by bringing technology and video meetings with other older people to their homes (similar to daycare social gatherings for the elderly).

This is not easy because social distancing is hard or impossible when people have visitors, however careful the latter.

Even so, every effort should be made to crack this huge problem of deterioration caused by lack of social contact. And there are still partial solutions like visitors talking through windows that could yet be encouraged through campaigns.

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