Ms Sinéad Keane:

It was not from our own statistics; it was from an EU survey. I can provide the Senator with the details of it afterwards. I do not have the name to hand. There is a growing body of research around this, unfortunately.

Spunout runs a 24-7 crisis text line. More than 45,000 young people have contacted us to date this year. Unfortunately, loneliness is one of the top issues. One in five of them is experiencing it. We are seeing a real tip from what we would traditionally have talked about, that is the elderly population experiencing loneliness. Now we are seeing young people experience higher levels of loneliness and isolation.