This article pokes holes and casts doubt on a concept of a loneliness epidemic, just to conclude, "Americans have been repeatedly warned about loneliness and about the loss of friendship. The alarms, of course, may not always be false. History might prove the 2010s to be one of those times where there was some reason for concern — at least about young men." And then "...because false alarms come with a price, particularly in diverting our attention from other, less amorphous matters, such as economic dislocations, violence, and real epidemics."

If you put the bottom line up front, the rest of the article doesn't support that conclusion. It doesn't address the resources that we're spending on loneliness, or what's a better use of those resources.

There's another swing and a miss for the conclusion a little earlier too. "If there has been increasing chatter about loneliness, then, it has been more the result of higher expectations and greater self-reflection — especially among the chattering classes — rather than greater isolation."

So people aren't more lonely, they just feel more lonely. But that's not true loneliness. Again, you could write an interesting article on that, but this article isn't.

This article ultimately comes off as a call to inaction because the alternative is believing there's a loneliness epidemic and being tempted to do something about it.