HEATING on, television droning away, unopened Christmas
presents and a mountain of mail – as a woman’s
dead body lay undiscovered for two years.
Joyce Vincent, 40, was found in the main room of her
tiny North London flat when an officer from the Metropolitan
Housing Trust took a locksmith to the flat after
thousands of pounds of rent arrears had accumulated.
“Where was everybody?” asked the local MP.
“A lot of people live here on their own”, said a neighbour.
“Everyone keeps to themselves.”
“It is a sad reflection of the individualist times we are
living in”, commented a local minister.
Seven million people live alone in the UK, almost a
third of UK households. The proportion of one-person
households has more than trebled for working-age people
over the last four decades, while people of pension
age are twice as likely to be living on their own.
And it is acknowledged that isolation and loneliness
are key factors in the increase of depression. Ten times
more people suffer from major (clinical) depression now
than sixty years ago.
There’s no getting away from it: people need to be tied
together by something stronger than mere proximity. Next
door may as well be ten miles away. We need true friendship.
We need shared lives. We need to heed the Maker’s
instructions: it was God, back at the beginning, who said,
“It is not good for man to be alone”.
Souces:
The Times, www.statistics.gov.uk, www.clinicaldepression.co.uk
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