The 19th US surgeon general on ending loneliness
WE CAN BE THE MEDICINE THAT EACH OTHER NEED”: THE 19TH US SURGEON GENERAL ON ENDING LONELINESS
London October 15, 2018
Senior reporter, Editor of How to be Human
Vivek Murthy know what it’s like to be lonely.
Growing up, the former US surgeon general says, he felt socially isolated in school. “I dealt with some issues around racism, and it sort of impacted my self-confidence,” he recalled last week at the 10th Annual Campaign to End Loneliness conference in London. “When I would pull up to school in morning, when my parents would drop me off, I would feel that pit in my stomach, that you often feel on the first day of classes or exams … It was worrying about being lonely.” He was too ashamed to tell his parents how he felt at the time. “Saying that I was lonely was saying I wasn’t worthy of being loved, and no one wants to feel that.”But since his tenure as surgeon general under president Barack Obama, Murthy has been working to end that kind of stigma for good. During his term between 2014 and 2017, Murthy labeled loneliness an “epidemic” and said the government should play a role in trying to confront it—an idea that’s also picking up steam in countries like the UK, Denmark, Australia, and Japan.
For the remainder of the article, please see
https://qz.com/1420602/feeling-lonely-vivek-murthy-says-to-get-out-of-your-head-and-help-someone-else/