Joyce Fegan: How do you count the cost of loneliness?

"The cost of loneliness may well be unquantifiable but its impact will be far reaching. If you're looking for it - psychologists say it lands in the chest and sits there like an ache"

While individually we may feel powerless to slow climate change, end a pandemic, avoid a recession, or reverse the terminal illness of a loved one, loneliness is one thing we have the day-to-day ability to address and it is incumbent on us to do so.

FOR a few days in June it was perfect. The house was in Connemara, on the road out from Clifden, heading towards Cleggan. First to arrive were my
parents, in their 70s, and their dog.

We got pictures “on the WhatsApp” of sunset from the cottage — its position to the degree and its time to the second. My sister and her twins arrived next. And with them the WhatsApp communications pivoted to the practical, with notes around bedroom arrangements and reminders to pack the “blackout blinds” — as essential to parenting as soothers, snacks, scooters, and screen time.