2022-2023
The growing prevalence of social isolation in the United States was recognized as a risk to public health years before the COVID pandemic. The South Carolina Institute of Medicine and Public Health (IMPH), in partnership with the South Carolina Department on Aging is convening a taskforce comprised of stakeholders from across South Carolina to collaborative identify approaches to address social isolation in older adults. The benefits of increasing social connection in South Carolina are innumerable.
Taskforce meetings will be held monthly in October and November 2022 and January through April 2023. The deliverable of this Taskforce is a report containing research and recommendations, to be released in June of 2023. Recommendations are developed through the cooperation and collaboration of taskforce members during meetings, one-on-one interviews and other workshop methods.
MISSION & ACTION
The Institute, in partnership with the South Carolina Department on Aging, is convening South Carolina experts and those with lived experiences to work collaboratively to create state-specific recommendations to reduce social isolation in older adults.
The Social Isolation in Older Adults Taskforce, launched in October 2022, is chaired by former Representative MaryGail Douglas.
DEFINITIONS
Social Isolation: objectively being alone, having few relationships or infrequent social contact.
Loneliness: subjectively feeling alone from a discrepancy between one’s desired level of connection and one’s actual level.
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine 2020. Social Isolation and Loneliness in Older Adults: Opportunities for the Health Care System. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/25663.