Impact · 3 min read

Why social wellbeing is one of the three areas

About half of US adults report loneliness, and time spent alone has grown. What the Surgeon General and the CDC have published.

Social wellbeing is one of the three areas the proceeds from Human Hope Daily plans are meant for. It is harder to measure than test scores or food budgets, but two federal health sources have tried. This article sets out what they found.

What the Surgeon General reported in 2023

In 2023 the US Surgeon General published an advisory titled Our Epidemic of Loneliness and Isolation. It states that approximately half of US adults report experiencing loneliness, with some of the highest rates among young adults. It also cites a 2022 study in which only 39 percent of US adults said they felt very connected to others.

The advisory treats this as a health matter. It reports that loneliness and social isolation increase the risk of premature death by 26 percent and 29 percent respectively. It also reports that poor or insufficient social connection is associated with a 29 percent increased risk of heart disease and a 32 percent increased risk of stroke.

The heart disease and stroke figures come from a synthesis of 16 long-term studies. Numbers like these describe risk across a population. They do not say what will happen to any one person.

How daily life has changed

The advisory draws on measures of how people spent their time from 2003 to 2020. Average time spent alone rose from 285 minutes a day in 2003 to 333 minutes a day in 2020, which the advisory puts at 24 more hours alone each month. Time spent with friends in person fell from 60 minutes a day to 20 over the same years.

Part of that change belongs to 2020, the first year of the pandemic. But the advisory’s figure for 2019 was already 309 minutes a day alone, so the trend did not begin there.

Ties to local institutions have weakened as well. The advisory notes that in 2018 only 16 percent of Americans said they felt very attached to their local community. It also notes that 47 percent of Americans said they belonged to a church, synagogue or mosque in 2020, down from 70 percent in 1999.

What the CDC measured

A study published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in 2024 used a 2022 survey of adults in 26 states, New Mexico among them. In it, 32.1 percent of adults said they always, usually or sometimes feel socially isolated from others, which is how the study defined loneliness. And 24.1 percent said they sometimes, rarely or never get the social and emotional support they need.

Support was scarcer where money was short. Among adults with household income below $25,000, 39.8 percent reported lacking social and emotional support. These figures are for the 26 states together, not for New Mexico alone.

What the foundation can say

Human Hope Foundation was incorporated in New Mexico on September 15, 2026. It is a new organization, and this article makes no claim about programs, partners, results or people served. What can be stated is its purpose statement, word for word: “The organization operates on a nonprofit basis to provide charitable, educational, and community support services to individuals and families in need.”

Community support is named in that purpose. The figures above describe the need. They do not describe anything the foundation has done about it.

What a plan purchase does

A plan is a purchase of access to Human Hope Daily. It is not a donation. The IRS has not recognized the foundation as tax-exempt, and purchases are not tax-deductible. After the cost of running the platform (payment processing, hosting, email and support), the proceeds support the foundation’s community programs in education, practical care and social wellbeing.

Social wellbeing is one of those three areas. This article does not say how the proceeds are divided among them or what they have paid for, and it claims nothing beyond that.

Sources

Published by Human Hope Foundation. A plan is a purchase, not a donation, and is not tax-deductible.