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A middle-aged Korean man looks at job postings at a job fair held at the Coex event hall in Seoul’s Gangnam District on Nov. 5, 2019. (Yonhap)

A new report has shown that Koreans in their 50s and 60s face the highest risk of dying “lonely deaths” out of the overall population. In particular, those experiencing economic difficulties due to early job loss or divorce report feelings of severe social isolation. Some experts are urging the expansion of dedicated personnel to connect such people with local communities and provide them with much-needed welfare services.

The term “lonely death” is defined in Korean law as “any person who has lived alone, disconnected from family, relatives and neighbors, dies alone from suicide, disease, etc. and his or her corpse is discovered after a certain period of time.”

According to a 2022 survey on lonely deaths released by the Ministry of Health and Welfare on Wednesday, the percentage of lonely deaths among those in their 50s and 60s last year was 29.6% (1,001 people) and 29.0% (981 people), respectively. These figures account for more than half of the total number of those who died lonely deaths that year (3,378).

Those in their 70s and 80s accounted for 12.5% and 6.0% of lonely deaths, respectively.

In general, those in their 80s and older (around 35%) account for the highest number of deaths due to disease, for instance, but those in their 50s and 60s were found to be most likely to die lonely deaths (52.8%-60.1%).

In terms of gender, men died lonely deaths at a rate four times higher than women. For instance, in 2021, 2,817 lonely deaths occurred among men. This is 5.3 times more than for women (529).

Similarly, over the past five years, the average annual increase in lonely deaths of men was 10%, twice that of women (5.6%). Compared to the total number of deaths in general, lonely deaths of men accounted for 1.3%-1.6% while that of women stood at 0.3%-0.4%.

When looking at age and gender together, the survey showed that men in their 50s and 60s accounted for about half of all lonely deaths. This trend can be seen clearly since 2017. For the past five years, the rate of lonely deaths for men in these age groups has shown an upward trend, from 45.3% in 2017, to 47.2% in 2018, 46% in 2019, 51.5% in 2020 and 52.1% in 2021.

The Ministry of Health and Welfare’s analysis also showed that a relatively high number of lonely deaths were among middle-aged men who experienced a sudden rupture in their social relationships due to unemployment, retirement or divorce.

This is because men belonging to this generation, who grew up with the gender norm that men go out and make money while women stay home and do housework, are not used to doing domestic chores or being home alone. As such, if these people end up in a single-person household, they become at higher risk of dying alone.

“Society’s view of middle-aged men who don’t work remains poor, so if they face economic difficulties, there are many cases when they find it difficult to communicate with those around them,” says Song In-joo, a researcher at the Seoul Welfare Foundation. “Unemployment, business failure, divorce, and more are the main causes of the rupture of social ties,” Song added.

Also noteworthy is how the suicide rate for those dying lonely deaths ranged from 16.5% to 19.5%. The younger the person, the more likely that their lonely death was a suicide. For instance, in 2021, suicides made up 56.6% and 40.2% of lonely deaths for those in their 20s and 30s, respectively. This is much higher than the average of 17.3%.

“There are some people in their 20s and 30s who choose to cut themselves off from society and do not seek welfare services,” the Ministry of Health and Welfare said. “It is necessary to actively link suicide prevention policies, which include mental and psychological support, with policies aimed at preventing lonely deaths among young people,” the ministry explained.

To this end, the Ministry of Health and Welfare is considering a plan to expand its pilot project for preventing and managing lonely deaths nationwide. The plan provides services including living and psychological support by finding people at risk of dying alone based on information such as debt and other factors. The pilot project is currently being implemented in nine cities and provinces including Seoul, Gyeonggi Province and Busan. The problem, however, is manpower.

According to data from the Korea Social Security Information Service, a single welfare officer had to conduct an average of 113.4 surveys of at-risk households by visiting villages, townships, and neighborhoods.

In most local governments, the same social welfare official is in charge of supporting people belonging to at-risk households and for preventing lonely deaths.

“For a person at risk of dying alone to be (re)immersed into society, how to establish relationships is very important and we need the help of public institutions, neighbors and also citizens,” says Chung Ick-Joong, a professor at the Department of Social Welfare of Ewha Womans University.

“We can report isolated people and provide welfare services by designating [local social workers, etc.] as honorary civil servants,” Chung added.

By Cheon Ho-sung, staff reporter; Lim Jae-hee, staff reporter

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