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Homelessness as a Public Health Risk - Report

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Added on  2020-05-28

Homelessness as a Public Health Risk - Report

   Added on 2020-05-28

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Running head:Homelessness as a public health riskHomelessness a public health riskName of the StudentName of the UniversityAuthor Note
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1Homelessness as a public health riskContentsIntroduction:...............................................................................................................................2Facts about homelessness:......................................................................................................2Homelessness in UK:.............................................................................................................2Importance of discussing public health challenges:...................................................................3Literature review: Public health perspectives on Homelessness:..............................................9What could be done to address the challenge?.........................................................................12Provision of Service:............................................................................................................12Preventative Measures:........................................................................................................12Accommodation:..................................................................................................................13Social Networking:...............................................................................................................13Promoting individual well being:.........................................................................................14Barriers and Recommendations:..............................................................................................15Barriers:................................................................................................................................15Recommendations:...............................................................................................................17Conclusion:..............................................................................................................................18References:...............................................................................................................................20
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2Homelessness as a public health riskIntroduction:Facts about homelessness:Homelessness or lack of home can be a devastating, dangerous and isolatingexperience, which can increase the risk of morbidity and mortality (due to the lack of securityand healthcare, as well as the risk of psychological trauma and suicide risk. It can be causeddue to socio-economic factors like a lack of affordable accommodation, poverty, lack of jobs,and personal life events leading to homelessness, apart from mental and physical healthissues, addition issues and psychological trauma. Additionally, being homeless can furtherincrease risks for morbidity and mortality, and further complicate the health risks.Homelessness can be categorized into three types: Rough Sleeping, Statutory Homelessnessand Hidden Homelessness (Crisis 2018). Rough sleeping refers to the individuals sleepingrough on the streets, Statutory Homelessness refers to individuals who lack a secure place tolive, while hidden homelessness refers to individuals who have not approached or divulgedtheir lack of home to the authorities, and hence have not been listed homeless. United Nationsdescribes ‘absolute homelessness’ as a condition arising due to a lack of physical shelter,causing people to sleep outdoors, in vehicles, abandoned buildings, or places not intended forhuman settlement, while describing ’relative homelessness’ who have physical shelters thatdoes not meet basic health and safety standards (Hwang 2018). Homelessness in UK:Reports from November, 2017 shows that as estimated 307,000 (one out of every 200people) people sleeping rough or lack adequate housing in the UK, with London having thehighest number of homeless people, and increasing problems of homelessness in places likeBroxbourne, Luton and Chelmsford (Butler 2017).
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3Homelessness as a public health riskFigure 1: Distribution of the 300,000 homeless people in Great Britain; source (Butler 2017).The number of people sleeping on the streets have increased by 134% since 2011, andis not considered as a ‘national crisis’, with the government investing One billion pound tosolve the problem (BBC News 2017). This has drawn strong criticism on the failure of thegovernment to tackle the issue properly.The aim of the report is to identify the necessity of discussing homelessness and achallenge to public health, keeping a view of the risks to mental and physical well being ofhomeless people, and the factors contributing to their homelessness as well as exacerbatingits effects. It will also try to identify the key challenges in the provision of care for homelesspeople, and approaches to overcome them. Importance of discussing public health challenges:Sreelakshmi and Anish (2013) points out that improvement in community health can bebrought about by an interaction between conventional health sector as well as other sectors.While James (2018) mentions that active discussion is an essential element of collaborationof efforts. Identification of the problem followed by the discussion about how the problemaffects public health can be a part of the community health improvement process (The
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4Homelessness as a public health riskNational Academics of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine 2018). Keeping in mind suchconsiderations, this report will discuss Homelessness as a public health challenge in the UK.It has been pointed that homelessness can increase the risk for different types of chronicand acute health conditions. Inter relation between health and homelessness can becategorized into three types:a)Health conditions that can lead to homelessnessb)Health conditions that can occur due to homelessnessc)Challenges in the treatment of homeless individuals(Comittee on Health Care for Homeless People INSTITUTE OF MEDICINE 2018).Kelly (1985) pointed out that the risk of health issues like skin disorder, or trauma canbe greatly increased due to homelessness, and can also cause a rapid deterioration of a minorhealth condition into a serious one. Other health risks can include malnutrition, oral healthissues, parasitic infections, degenerative diseases, cirrhosis of liver, venereal disease,alcoholism, drug abuse and its related health issues. Studies by Queen et al. (2017) shows theprevalence of long term health conditions among homeless individuals compared to thegeneral population in the UK, as shown by the figure below:
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5Homelessness as a public health riskFigure 2: Prevalence of long term health conditions among homeless and general public;source (Queen et al. 2017).Figure 3: Prevalence of Depression among general population compared to other homelesscohorts, HHS-Homeless Health Services, a- clinically recorded data, b-Self reported data;source (Queen et al. 2017).
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