S1E36 / Alone Together / Julianne Holt-Lunstad, Lucy Flamm, Jeff Howe, Jackie Jones

EPIDEMIC with Dr. Celine Gounder

KFF Health News and Just Human Productions

Science, #Coronavirus, Health & Fitness, #Smallpox, Documentary, #Covid19, #Sarscov2, #Eradication, Life Sciences, Society & Culture, #Covid, Medicine

4.6 • 1K Ratings

🗓️ 17 July 2020

⏱️ 20 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

“Loneliness is something we hear a lot from individuals in our community. It's a time of physical distancing. And at first, this was really articulated as social distancing. And I think that's a problem. Yes, we are physically disconnected, but that doesn't mean that we're socially disconnected.” — Lucy Flamm Since COVID swept through the world, shelter in place and social distancing measures have kept us physically apart from our friends, families, and communities. Loneliness and isolation are pressing concerns as social distancing recommendations continue to be in place. But, being physically apart doesn’t mean that we can’t still come together. In a time of physical separation, mutual aid societies — local networks of neighbors helping out neighbors with anything from picking up groceries to pooling money for tires — are an example of community-building during COVID. In today’s episode, we hear from Dr. Julianne Holt-Lunstad, a psychologist at Brigham Young University that studies the health effects of loneliness. Then, we hear stories from members of the Cambridge Mutual Aid Society — organizing volunteer Lucy Flamm; Jeff Howe, a neighborhood pod leader; and Jackie Jones, a community advocate, and mutual aid recipient — about how COVID and mutual aid has changed their communities. Nominations for the 2020 People's Choice Podcast Awards opened on July 1st. To show your support, please go to podcastawards.com and nominate us in the People’s Choice and Health categories. This podcast was created by Just Human Productions. We're powered and distributed by Simplecast. We're supported, in part, by listeners like you. #SARSCoV2 #COVID19 #COVID #coronavirus

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hi, I'm Annabel Chen. I'm an intern working with Just Human Productions on Epidemic.
0:05.0	Nominations for the 2020 People's Choice Podcast Awards open on July 1st.
0:09.0	To show your support, please go to Podcast Awards.com and nominate us in the People's Choice and
0:14.6	health categories. That's podcast awards.com. Thank you. Hi, I'm Dr. Saline Gounder, and this is epidemic.
0:30.0	Today is Friday, July. Hi, I'm Dr. Saline Gounder, and this is epidemic.
0:33.5	Today is Friday, July 17th. The first stay-at-home orders of the pandemic started in February. By March, dozens of states had issued lockdowns.
0:53.2	Non-essential businesses were closed, and people were told to stay home.
0:57.6	For some stuck at home, it felt like being in a submarine,
1:02.3	trapped in a house with too many people, but there was another side to those orders too, loneliness.
1:08.8	You know, anecdotally, we're hearing a lot of people really struggling right now.
1:14.4	This is Julian Holt Lunt-Lunstadt.
1:16.3	She's a psychologist at Brigham Young University and a leading researcher on loneliness.
1:21.6	Having social events and rituals disrupted, birthday parties not happening, you know,
1:27.8	funerals even, suddenly we can't have those people around us.
1:32.0	Julianne says that loneliness works the same. can't have those people around us.
1:33.0	Julianne says that loneliness works the same way that Thirst drives someone to look for water.
1:38.8	People are social creatures and they want to seek out others.
1:42.4	It's unclear to what extent given this current situation,
1:46.0	whether people are able to connect in other ways and adapt
1:52.0	or are still really struggling with some of those distressing feelings.
1:58.2	But loneliness isn't just a distressing feeling. It could be a lot worse. I've heard loneliness being compared to smoking
2:06.3	as being bad for your health. Can you sort of flush that out for us a little bit
	...

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