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Almost 4.5 million over 65’s claim to have felt lonely during later life

4th September 2019
Posted by Aston Avery

Many of us will have seen an older person struggling to walk up the stairs or perhaps sitting alone and have wanted to offer some company. Often, we want to help them, but are not entirely sure how to do this. New research released today has brought to attention the impact this lack of communication can have on older people in the UK with almost 2.6m people aged 65 and over say they speak to three or less people in an average week, yet 6m older people agree that just a few minutes of conversation makes a difference to their week.

As it stands, over half a million of those who’ve been lonely claim it stops them going out and about in everyday life. Yet, this loneliness isn’t recognized by the younger generations, with six in ten (60%) 16-45 year olds saying they were unaware of 1.4 million older people are affected. This research comes courtesy of Cadbury’s Dairy Milk and Age UK to help combat the scourge of loneliness in older people through the country with their new ‘Donate Your Words’ campaign. For the first time ever, Cadbury will remove the words from their Dairy Milk Bars and are ‘donating’ them to the charity as well as 30 pence from every bar going to help the cause.

Aston spoke to Jane Vass, director of policy and research at AGE UK to discuss the research and also about the charity teaming up with Cadbury to raise awareness in loneliness.