Dr Vivek Murthy: loneliness is public health risk

‘There are real consequences to our physical and mental health’


Katty Kay speaks to Dr Vivek Murthy, former US Surgeon-General
about the challenge posed by loneliness and isolation in the
modern world. Dr. Murthy, the first person of Indian descent in
the post, was appointed during the second Obama administration.
He then returned in 2021, serving until the beginning of this
year.


The Surgeon-General’s job is to provide the American public with
the best scientific information available on how to improve their
health and reduce the risk of illness and injury. They also
oversee the country’s 6,000 public health professionals who
respond to national health threats and public health crises.


It was during his second term, under the Biden administration,
that Dr. Murthy first started expressing concern about the impact
of social media on the mental health and wellbeing of young
people. He described the loneliness epidemic of social isolation
as a risk to public health akin to smoking and diabetes.


In this interview, he examines the scale of the challenge posed
by loneliness and how artificial intelligence, or AI, on the one
hand is being used to tackle it, but may also be simultaneously
adding to the problem. The Interview brings you conversations
with people shaping our world, from all over the world. The best
interviews from the BBC. You can listen on the BBC World Service,
Mondays and Wednesdays at 0700 GMT. Or you can listen to The
Interview as a podcast, out twice a week on BBC Sounds or
wherever you get your podcasts.


Presenter: Katty Kay Producers: Ben Cooper, Aiden Johnson and
Ilyas Kirmani Editor: Justine Lang


Get in touch with us on email TheInterview@bbc.co.uk and use the
hashtag #TheInterviewBBC on social media.


(Image: Surgeon General Vivek Murthy Credit: Tom Williams/CQ-Roll
Call, Inc via Getty Images)