In a groundbreaking initiative, a major Swedish pharmacy chain, Apotek Hjärtat, is offering its employees paid time off to focus on strengthening their social connections and combating loneliness. The “friendcare” or “vänvård” scheme, launched in April 2025, provides staff with 15 minutes per week or an hour per month during working hours to engage in activities that nurture their relationships.
Yasmine Lindberg, a 45-year-old pharmacy worker, is one of the 11 participants in the pilot project. She admits to struggling with loneliness, especially since her separation from her partner four years ago, which led to fewer social invitations with couples in her network. The friendcare scheme has given Yasmine the opportunity to reconnect with friends, whether through phone calls, text messages, or in-person meetups.
“I’m really tired when I go home. I don’t have time or energy to meet my friends,” Yasmine explains. “Now, thanks to the Apotek Hjärtat pilot scheme, I’m granted time to focus on strengthening my friendships or making new connections. I feel happier. You can’t live through the internet like most people do these days.”
The initiative is part of a broader effort by the Swedish government to address the growing issue of loneliness. In July 2025, Sweden’s Public Health Agency released the country’s first national strategy aimed at minimizing loneliness, calling for increased collaboration between the business community, municipalities, researchers, and civil society.
“We need to have a greater awareness about this, that this is something that really affects health, and affects the economy as well,” says Health Minister Jakob Forssmed.
Apotek Hjärtat’s CEO, Monica Magnusson, says the inspiration for the company’s friendcare project came partly from a previous collaboration with the mental health charity Mind, which demonstrated the positive impact of short, meaningful conversations between pharmacists and customers.
“We try and see what the effects are from having the opportunity to spend a bit of time every week on safeguarding your relationships,” explains Magnusson.
The project is also part of a business network called “Together against involuntary loneliness,” initiated by Forssmed in 2023. The network includes around 20 major Nordic brands, such as IKEA, Strawberry, and HSB, Sweden’s largest federation of cooperative housing, who meet to share their experiences and strategies for tackling loneliness.
“It’s quite a different approach to working together, collaborating as companies in an area where you just let competition go, and instead try and figure out ‘how can we tackle this common obstacle that we have?’,” says Magnusson.
While it’s too soon to determine whether the friendcare project will be rolled out more widely, the initial results from self-assessment surveys indicate higher levels of life satisfaction among participants compared to before the scheme’s launch. The Health Minister is closely monitoring the pharmacy chain’s efforts, though he has not made any promises about the government scaling up the initiative or providing tax deductions.
Experts like psychologist Daniel Ek argue that addressing loneliness in Sweden requires a holistic approach, looking at factors such as unemployment, income inequality, and the impact of digital technology on social interaction. As the country continues to grapple with this public health concern, initiatives like Apotek Hjärtat’s friendcare scheme offer a promising model for businesses to support their employees and contribute to the broader societal effort.