Alone, toge­ther

Walking through the woods toge­ther and belly laug­hing. Shed­ding a tear toge­ther and feeling appre­cia­ted. Or simply giving that sense of secu­rity. Quality is key to every rela­ti­onship. The absence of relia­ble rela­ti­onships with friends, rela­ti­ves and neigh­bours can lead to social isola­tion and loneli­ness. Loneli­ness can affect anyone. In contrast to being alone, which can be a posi­tive expe­ri­ence for those invol­ved, loneli­ness invol­ves a lack of social connec­tion. The indi­vi­du­als affec­ted are soci­ally isolated.

Health risk of loneliness

Accor­ding to figu­res from the Fede­ral Statis­ti­cal Office, the percen­tage of people who some­ti­mes or often feel lonely decrea­ses with age. Howe­ver, accor­ding to the age moni­tor from Pro Senec­tute Switz­er­land, 26.6% of people over the age of 55 still suffer from loneli­ness. This is the equi­va­lent of around 444,500 people across Switz­er­land. And loneli­ness heigh­tens their risk of mental and physi­cal health issues consider­a­bly. The feeling of loneli­ness is parti­cu­larly prono­un­ced amongst people over the age of 85: More than a third (36.8%) of this age group are affec­ted. Accor­ding to Health Promo­tion Switz­er­land, older people who feel lonely have a shorter life expec­tancy, as they often suffer from high blood pres­sure and depres­sive episodes.

Criti­cal life events

In old age, the time comes to say good­bye to many things. Criti­cal life events are often marked by loss. The death of a rela­tive, part­ner or friend can lead to isola­tion, as can reti­re­ment or sepa­ra­tion. Accor­ding to Health Promo­tion Switz­er­land, social networks and social parti­ci­pa­tion demons­tra­bly decline with age, parti­cu­larly from the age of 75.

Switzerland’s lack of a loneli­ness strategy

Switz­er­land does not have a natio­nal stra­tegy to tackle loneli­ness. The connect! asso­cia­tion wants to close this gap, toge­ther with a top-class scien­ti­fic advi­sory board and rese­ar­chers from all over the coun­try. After all, loneli­ness causes great suffe­ring and, accor­ding to global rese­arch findings, has signi­fi­cant health and econo­mic conse­quen­ces, compa­ra­ble to those of tobacco consump­tion and obesity. Foun­ded in 2023, the asso­cia­tion coor­di­na­tes a network of stake­hol­ders from cantons, muni­ci­pa­li­ties, insti­tu­ti­ons and civil society organisations. 

Toge­ther, we are deve­lo­ping measu­res to prevent and reduce loneliness.

Accor­ding to Thomas Pfluger, co-program mana­ger of the ‘connect!’ asso­cia­tion: ‘Toge­ther, we are deve­lo­ping measu­res to prevent and reduce loneli­ness.’ Accor­ding to Pfluger, these include raising public aware­ness of the importance of loneli­ness and deve­lo­ping special tools to iden­tify and support lonely people. 

Joint action plan

The asso­cia­tion has a ten-year outlook. ‘For the first three years, we have deve­lo­ped an action plan with the invol­vement of nume­rous scien­tists and prac­ti­tio­ners,’ explains Pfluger. ‘It is based on the latest findings from rese­arch and prac­tice, and is speci­fi­cally aimed at older people.’ The work is made possi­ble by broad finan­cial support from the Age Foun­da­tion, the Elly Schnorf-Schmid Foun­da­tion, the Dr med. Kurt Fries Foun­da­tion, the Ernst Göhner Foun­da­tion and the Beis­heim Foun­da­tion. The action plan is now being imple­men­ted with our part­ners. ‘We are reli­ant on long-term funding,’ empha­si­ses the co-program manager.

Great inte­rest

The first ‘connect!’ sympo­sium on the topic of loneli­ness took place on 20 Febru­ary 2025. There was a lot of inte­rest and the event was sold out. Experts from social work, nursing, medi­cine, psycho­logy, churches, asso­cia­ti­ons for older people and repre­sen­ta­ti­ves of muni­ci­pa­li­ties and cantons from all over Switz­er­land took part. The broad inte­rest shows that there is a need for coor­di­na­tion and commu­ni­ca­tion on the subject. ‘Switz­er­land has a lot of services for lonely people, but people often don’t make use of them. Our aim is to improve access,’ says Pfluger. One of the many services on offer is the project ‘Loneli­ness in Old Age – Ways out of Loneli­ness’ [Einsam­keit im Alter – Wege aus der Einsam­keit] run by the Swiss Insti­tute for Addic­tion and Health Rese­arch (ISGF). It was initia­ted with finan­cial support from Health Promo­tion Switz­er­land, among others. The insti­tute is an asso­cia­ted insti­tute of the Univer­sity of Zurich. 

Theatre as an icebreaker

The topic of alco­hol in old age is also a major taboo – loneli­ness can be closely linked to alco­hol addic­tion. ‘Theatre is an incre­di­bly good way to open doors – it tack­les the diffi­cult issue of loneli­ness in a playful way and gets people talking to each other,’ says Susanne Schaaf from the ISGF. The discus­sion leader is author and jour­na­list Marius Leuten­eg­ger, who hand­les the subject matter with great sensi­ti­vity and gets people talking. ‘Loneli­ness in Old Age’ aims to promote social invol­vement in people over the age of 65.

The project uses theatre to achieve this. Each theatre is perfor­med by four senior actors with whom the audi­ence can iden­tify. With theatre and mode­ra­ted discus­sion as an inter­ac­tive format, the ‘Loneli­ness in Old Age’ project raises aware­ness and enga­ges those affec­ted in conver­sa­tion. Ever­y­day scenes – such as going out into the great outdoors or meeting others outside the home – and mode­ra­ted discus­sions create a lively exch­ange. The project is aimed at older people who are mobile. Susanne Schaaf adds:

Older people with disa­bi­li­ties often take part in our events, too, whether they have rest­ric­ted mobi­lity or problems with their vision or hearing. We also respond to these indi­vi­du­als’ needs and opportunities.

The ISGF imple­ments the project in colla­bo­ra­ti­ons with paris­hes, muni­ci­pa­li­ties and local orga­ni­sa­ti­ons for the elderly. The aim is to promote acces­si­ble encoun­ters and over­come social isola­tion through active parti­ci­pa­tion. ‘We didn’t want a ‘gnarly’ work­shop where parti­ci­pants sit in awkward silence,’ says the researcher.

They were able to reach more than 1,000 older people with the 2022/2023 pilot project in the cantons of Zurich and Bern. The great success enab­led them to conti­nue the project. Asso­cia­ti­ons and cantons in German-spea­king Switz­er­land are provi­ding finan­cial support for the project. At the same time as the theatre group, the ‘Einsam­keit im Alter’ project laun­ched a text messa­ging service. The aim was to draw older people’s atten­tion to local events with brief messa­ges and moti­vate them to take action.

Howe­ver, it soon became clear that this service is rarely used by the over-80s, who often don’t have a mobile phone – face-to-face encoun­ters are more important to them.

Easy to access 

‘Sugges­ti­ons and acti­vi­ties must be acces­si­ble: Going for a walk or having a coffee toge­ther can be the first step out of isola­tion,’ says Schaaf. As a result of the guarded expe­ri­ence with the text messa­ging service, the focus is on rela­ti­onship-orien­ted formats: At our theatre events, local orga­ni­sa­ti­ons should be present with stands on site to present their services in person. There is coffee and cake and parti­ci­pa­tion is possi­ble without any barriers.

‘Loneli­ness in old age is often unde­re­sti­ma­ted. This can also be a stressful situa­tion for family carers if they have little time left to socia­lise outside the home,’ Schaaf points out. She adds:

Loneli­ness isn’t a one-way street – it’s give and take, and those who give in the context of volun­teer work such as visi­ting services often get a great deal in return.

Acces­si­bi­lity is also the key word for Eve Bino, initia­tor and co-mana­ging direc­tor of the Silber­netz Schweiz association.

Little moments together

Almost four years ago, the Silber­netz Schweiz asso­cia­tion crea­ted acces­si­ble oppor­tu­ni­ties for commu­ni­ca­tion with its ‘malre­den’ project. The service compri­ses three elements: a free and anony­mous daily tele­phone hotline (0800 890 890), estab­lished tele­phone tandem part­ner­ships and infor­ma­tion on other support services. The project offers older people an acces­si­ble oppor­tu­nity to main­tain social cont­acts and reduce loneli­ness. An easily acces­si­ble conver­sa­tion service has been crea­ted with the daily hotline. ‘Use of the service is constantly growing, with few fluc­tua­tions,’ says Bino. She is deligh­ted: ‘crea­ting small posi­tive moments, feeling connec­ted in conver­sa­tion – that’s exactly the idea behind malre­den.’ Around 8,000 confi­den­tial conver­sa­ti­ons take place every year. That’s around 20 phone calls per day. ‘The daily hotline excee­ded initial expec­ta­ti­ons, had a clear and instanta­neous impact on loneli­ness and was parti­cu­larly appre­cia­ted by users for its flexi­bi­lity, empa­thy and emotio­nal support,’ accor­ding to an evalua­tion report from the Univer­sity of Applied Scien­ces and Arts Northwes­tern Switz­er­land (FHNW) for Social Work and Health. Accor­ding to the FHNW evalua­tion, most malre­den users are single women living on their own, aged between 65 and 84. Appro­xi­m­ately 60 tandem part­ner­ships have been set up since the begin­ning. Clearly, people are more reluc­tant to enter into a binding, long-term tele­phone relationship.

Volun­teers lend an ear

The malre­den project would proba­bly not be conceiva­ble without commit­ted volun­teers. They are the ones who lend an ear on the daily hotline, conduct the discus­sions, guide the tandem part­ner­ships and offer people with feelings of loneli­ness a valuable listening ear. But listening takes lear­ning – that’s why all volun­teers receive trai­ning. As Bino empha­si­ses: ‘The trai­ning is essen­tial: It’s about holding conver­sa­ti­ons, deal­ing sensi­tively with feelings of loneli­ness and, above all, knowing your boun­da­ries. We are not a crisis hotline.’ The volun­teers are a wonderfully diverse bunch, accor­ding to the Co-Mana­ging Direc­tor. Many of the women and slightly fewer of the men are over 60 and have a lot of life expe­ri­ence them­sel­ves. This life expe­ri­ence is obviously desi­red and appre­cia­ted. But there are youn­ger volun­teers, too, such as social scien­ces students and commit­ted indi­vi­du­als from other fields. Volun­teers are supported – with super­vi­sion, exch­ange oppor­tu­ni­ties and a listening ear for their own concerns. They give their time, empa­thy and atten­tion – and receive rewar­ding encoun­ters and meaningful expe­ri­en­ces in return.

The right channel

One of the main aims of the ‘connect!’ asso­cia­tion is to faci­li­tate impro­ved acces­si­bi­lity for the services on offer. But how do older people, espe­ci­ally those suffe­ring from feelings of loneli­ness, find out about the oppor­tu­ni­ties? ‘The use of diffe­rent chan­nels is crucial,’ empha­si­ses Susanne Schaaf from Loneli­ness in Old Age – Ways out of Loneli­ness. One muni­ci­pa­lity had adver­ti­sed the ISGF’s theatre programme on its digi­tal chan­nels. There was no response. So it sent a letter with a flyer to all the elderly people in the commu­nity. Almost 100 appli­ca­ti­ons were recei­ved within just a few days. ‘Our website and social media chan­nels do not directly address our primary target group. That’s why we rely on disse­mi­na­tors such as depart­ments, Spitex home care, the SRK and Pro Senec­tute, who recom­mend malre­den,’ says Eve Bino of malre­den. Addres­sing target audi­en­ces appro­pria­tely and commu­ni­ca­ting with poten­tial users, experts and commit­ted volun­teers on fami­liar ground seems promising.

Talking about it is key! Toge­ther, maybe on a walk in the woods.