The Need for Housing for Indigenous Australians

Running head: HEALTHCARE
HEALTHCARE
Name of the student
Name of the university
Author note

1HEALTHCARE
The Northern Territory government has been enquiring regarding the housing for the
Indigenous Australians (Baum et al. 2013). The government of the country has been considering
if they should facilitate housing for this targeted group of people. The improvement of the health
status of the indigenous people has been a debatable topic among the nation. The health gap that
exist among the indigenous and the non-indigenous population has been a major concern
highlighting the violation of the human rights of the indigenous population of Australia. The
essay aims to highlight the need of housing for the targeted group of people and the relevant
social determinants of health that needs to be considered. The essay furthermore provides
recommendation for the policy improvement.
Background
The Northern territory is one of the novel ward in the reference towards the fact that
includes undiscovered assets both human and natural. According to the statistics of the
governmental survey, more than 30% of the inhabitants of the northern territory are indigenous
community people living outside the major urban territories (Gee et al. 2014). The indigenous
population are the most discriminated and socially inclusive group who furthermore lacks the
proper chance or the opportunity to accessing proper health care facilities and the right to healthy
and safe living.
The housing situation for the indigenous community of people in Australia has
nevertheless remained very poor specifically in the remote areas and in the northern territory.
According to Stoneham, Goodman and Daube (2014) in the year 2012, nearly three among every
five of the indigenous people were living in the overcrowded houses due to the lack of housing.

2HEALTHCARE
The factor of homelessness has been a significant issue for the indigenous people of the
Northern territory. As per the census data, the indigenous people were classified as the homeless
ones in the jurisdiction (Kingsley et al. 2013). The figure below highlights the majority of the
people living in severely overcrowded house. The figure below furthermore indicates how the
culture of the indigenous population and the ways of the livelihood are affecting the health status
of the indigenous population of Australia.
Figure – The category of the homeless population of the indigenous community
Source- (Humanrights.gov.au. 2019)
There lies a huge literature and the data links among the health and the housing. Factors
such as early childhood development, metal health and social and emotional wellbeing, physical
health , exposure towards tobacco smoking and dust targets the effect of the poor housing and
homelessness among the health stats of the indigenous population.

3HEALTHCARE
The health rate inequalities is generally dependent on the social gradient along with the
spectrum of poor health as compared to the high gradient in the spectrum. There lies a strong
evident link among the social status of the community of indigenous population and the health
outcomes (Johnston et al. 2013). The factors of chronic stress connected to the challenges for
accessing safe housing, overcrowding and healthy environment and finally the lack of housing
resulting in homelessness are adversely affecting the health of the indigenous population in
Australia.
Social determinants of health (SDOH)
The social determinants of health are generally the economic and the social factors that
tends to have either positive or negative impact over the health of the community individuals by
the impact of the environment and the conditions on which they reside. According to Lea and
Torzillo (2016) health is not only a physical property but the social prosperity towards the entire
community. As per the definition by the World Health Organization, health is a particular state
of the complete mental, physical and social wellbeing. It is not a mere absence of the infirmity.
Source – (Waterworth et al. 2014)