During the pandemic, we got really good at being alone. We subscribed to streaming services, took up crafting, set up home gyms and figured out remote work. Now, several years after lockdowns, many people are still pretty reluctant to get out of the house. Perhaps we got too good at being alone?
Last year the U.S. surgeon general warned about an epidemic of loneliness. Kate Mulligan, an assistant professor at the Dalla Lana School of Public Health at the University of Toronto, has a plan to fight the tidal wave of depression and illness that often accompanies isolation. She’s an evangelist for something called social prescription. Instead of writing prescriptions for pills, health-care workers prescribe their patients social activities: a trip to a museum or park, or a fishing trip with a buddy. There’s overwhelming research proving that community interactions lead to better health outcomes.
Mulligan, who founded the Canadian Institute for Social Prescribing, makes her case in Maclean’s this week. “Social prescribing is not yet widely known enough to be a universal part of Canada’s health system,” she argues, “but it should be.”
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—Sarah Fulford, editor-in-chief, Maclean’s
