Loneliness is an inevitable result of Britain's economic model
The health secretary wants adults to look after their elderly parents to combat loneliness, as Asian people do. But Jeremy Hunt is wrong on who loneliness affects, wrong on what causes it, and wrong on what's happening in Asia
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Living alone: Britain has seen a big rise in solo living, from 17% of all households in 1971 to 31% now. Photograph: Zave Smith/Corbis
The officials who broke down Joyce Carol Vincent's door were meant to be serving an eviction notice. Instead they found her corpse slumped on the sofa, with the light from the TV still flickering over her.
By 2006, she had lain there for almost three years. Rent demands and other letters flooded the hallway; the food in the fridge had long since expired and piled around her skeleton were the presents she had just wrapped, for Christmas 2003. How Joyce died remains a mystery: there was no evidence of violence and she wasn't into drink or drugs. But the bigger question – the one that catches in your throat – is how it took three years for anyone to discover her death.
