Social networks are key to good health. That has some doctors seeking strategies to cure loneliness

At one point, Elaine Dawe's sense of loneliness enveloped her life.

"I was sad all the time. I was lonely. I didn't want to get dressed. I went for a week in my nightgown, didn't wash my hair sometimes for a week-and-a-half," said the 76-year-old Toronto woman.

Dawe is a human face of what the World Health Organization (WHO) recently declared a "global public health concern," in which loneliness has been linked to an increased risk of obesity, dementia, cardiovascular disease and stroke.

In November, WHO launched an international commission to tackle the problem. It is headed by U.S. surgeon general Dr. Vivek Murthy, who cited research that compared loneliness to the equivalent of smoking 15 cigarettes a day.

According to a recent poll of people in more than 140 countries, almost a quarter of the world's population — or about one billion people — feel lonely. The survey wasn't asked in China, meaning the number of people affected is likely even higher.

Loneliness knows no age. Once thought to be a problem of the elderly, a Statistics Canada survey from 2021 found that one in 10 Canadians over the age of 15 identified as being always or often lonely.

Nor does loneliness know boundaries. A recent survey by the Toronto Foundation found the city to be one of the loneliest in Canada, with residents withdrawing and interacting less with each other.

Many psychologists agree that the pandemic exacerbated our sense of loneliness. However the problem has been building for decades as people moved away  from friends, family, and community.

"Many people are no longer reporting that they are belonging to groups," said Julianne Holt-Lunstad, a psychology and neuroscience professor and director of the Social Connection and Health Lab at Brigham Young University in Utah. 

She said these include faith-based communities as well as civic engagement or groups that come together to explore hobbies.

Advancements in technology, from online banking to social media, have also made it easier to be alone, she said.

But Holt-Lunstad believes all this disconnectedness flies in the face of how humans are hard-wired.

"Social connection is crucial, and has been crucial, to human survival. When we feel loneliness, that is really our biology really signalling ... much like hunger and thirst."

It also literally changes our physiology.