A Surgeon General’s Advisory is a public statement that calls the American people’s attention to an urgent public health issue and provides recommendations for how it should be addressed. Advisories are reserved for significant public health challenges that require the nation’s immediate awareness and action.
This advisory calls attention to the importance of social connection for individual health as well as on community-wide metrics of health and well-being, and conversely the significant consequences when social connection is lacking. While social connection is often considered an individual challenge, this advisory explores and explains the cultural, community, and societal dynamics that drive connection and disconnection. It also offers recommendations for increasing and strengthening social connection through a whole-of-society approach.
The advisory presents a framework for a national strategy with specific recommendations for the institutions that shape our day-to-day lives: governments, health care systems and insurers, public health departments, research institutions, philanthropy, schools, workplaces, community-based organizations, technology companies, and the media.
This advisory draws upon decades of research from the scientific disciplines of sociology, psychology, neuroscience, political science, economics, and public health, among others. This document is not an exhaustive review of the literature. Rather, the advisory was developed through a substantial review of the available evidence, primarily found via electronic searches of research articles published in English and resources suggested by a wide range of subject matter experts, with priority given to meta-analyses and systematic literature reviews. The recommendations in the advisory draw upon the scientific literature and previously published recommendations from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the American Heart Association, and the World Health Organization.
The findings and recommendations in the advisory are also informed by consultations with subject matter experts from academia, health care, education, government, and other sectors of society, including more than 50 identified experts who reviewed and provided individual detailed feedback on an early draft that has informed this advisory. For additional background and to read other Surgeon General’s Advisories, visit SurgeonGeneral.gov.