2024 is a big year for research. I’m on a Churchill Fellowship studying why chronic loneliness has become an epidemic across the Western world. I will be investigating why severe isolation and weak social connections correlate with heart disease and mortality rates on a par with smoking and obesity. In May and June, my Fellowship took me to the UK, the Netherlands, Sweden and the US — countries who’ve already declared loneliness a public health emergency. I hope my findings become a catalyst for far-reaching social change here at home. Follow the links for The Loneliness Project to learn more.
A record number of people across Australia are experiencing loneliness. Politicians and policymakers are grappling with what can be done. But the lonely themselves are rarely part of the conversation. Until now.
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ABC Podcast - The Bright Side with Sabra Lane
In this episode Sabra Lane speaks with Ros Thomas about some of the novel solutions to the world's loneliness epidemic, including artificial intelligence, intergenerational housing, and medical intervention.
21 Aug 2024
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6PR Podcast - The Nightshift with Tod Johnston
Ros Thomas chats with Tod Johnston about her travels investigating loneliness for the Churchill Fellowship.
20 Aug 2024
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ABC Radio Perth - Mornings with Nadia Mitsopoulos
"It starts in the community" The scourge of loneliness and the novel way to deal with it.
11 July 2024
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Post Newspaper Article
Front page article in The POST Newspaper featuring interview with homeless man, Russell Price, for The Loneliness Project.
13 April 2024
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2023 Winston Churchill Fellowship Recipient
The Paul Tys Churchill Fellowship to study effective community models for the treatment of chronic loneliness.
“A strikingly original voice. Ros has the full writer’s arsenal. Her prose has a sensual joy.”
— Robert Drewe
Hi. Ros here.
I’m a Perth author and former television journalist of 20 years best known for my long-running weekend column in The West Australian Newspaper. My first book, Was It Something I Said —a collection of readers’ favourite columns — published by the University of WA Press— was their bestseller of the year. My first novel How to Shame the Devil, published by Night Parrot Press, went on to become a WA best seller in 2022. I’m also a big fan of short story and flash fiction. In 2021, I was awarded the UK Staunch Prize for the best flash fiction of the year from an international field. My short stories have also been published in a number of international anthologies.
In October 2023, I was awarded a Winston Churchill Fellowship to study the epidemic of chronic loneliness sweeping the world. In 2024 I will be travelling to the UK, Sweden, the Netherlands and the US to study global best practice in the identification and treatment of severe loneliness and post-Covid isolation. My new novel manuscript Cloud Eight also runs a concurrent theme of loneliness. If you’d like to read more about my Fellowship project, click the link below.
https://www.churchilltrust.com.au/fellow/ros-thomas-wa-2023/
For the better part of 2024, you’ll find me tucked into any number of cafes around Perth and Fremantle, deep in thought, deep in coffee, writing and rewriting my sentences on an 6-year-old laptop. Here are some other facts about me. Alternatively, keep scrolling and sign up for my newsletter.