Social Policy in Ontario

We need a national housing strategy now

Posted on October 14, 2015 in Inclusion Debates

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TheStar.com – Opinion/Commentary – For our health, our economy and our moral conscience, we must do better on housing.
Oct 13 2015.   By: Ritika Goel

I’ve known Derek for a few years now. We met a few days after he had been discharged from hospital and was sent to my clinic to get connected with a family doctor. He was in hospital for yet another manic episode like many times before. Bipolar disorder has severely impaired his young life, preventing him from holding down a steady job, leading him to drugs and gambling, and wearing down the strained relationship with his family.

I’ve watched him go in and out of hospital, always urging him to take his medication, but also knowing that it is hard for him to do so. But there was something about this visit that was radically different.

A few months ago, when Derek came into my office, he was on time for his appointment, he answered my questions coherently, and spoke for the first time about a plan for his future. I was baffled — we hadn’t changed his medications, but then I realized what had occurred. After over a year of bouncing between shelters, Derek had finally gotten housed. The transformation was remarkable, and he told me himself that he felt like a person again, simply because he had a stable place to stay.

Derek’s case is a reminder that access to housing is not just a matter of rights and justice, it’s also a matter of health. After all, imagine not having a place to safely store your medication, or living with the anxiety of being attacked, harassed, or robbed at any point, as people frequently are in shelters. For this reason, many make the difficult choice of sleeping outside, which comes with its own health risks. On any given night, 35,000 Canadians are homeless, and in any given year, 235,000 Canadians have been homeless.

If you’re wondering why we allow that to happen as a society, it’s a good question. Many people just like Derek end up homeless due to difficult life situations — whether it be due to a mental illness, losing their job, or a breakdown in their relationships. But once in the shelter system, getting access to safe, affordable housing is a challenge.

In Toronto alone, we have over 78,000 individuals and families on the waiting list for affordable housing with an average wait time of seven years. In Ontario, that number is over 168,000. Even after waiting for years to get access to affordable housing, when it finally arrives, often people find it unsafe and in a state of disrepair. This situation continues even though we know the cost of one night in affordable housing costs us much less than one night in a shelter, a hospital bed or jail. Unfortunately, those who are experiencing homelessness are much more likely to end up in all of those other scenarios if they can’t access the housing they need.

In fact, it is estimated that homelessness costs the economy about $7 billion a year in shelter, health care, and correctional services that could otherwise be avoided. Despite all this, Canada is the only G8 country that does not have a national housing strategy. The situation is so bad that in 2009, the UN Special Rapporteur on Housing declared the state of affairs in Canada a national emergency. This is not surprising considering in the past 25 years, while Canada’s population has been increasing, the investment in housing has only been decreasing.

We have heard much about the economy in this election, but barely any talk of the financial and social costs of having such high rates of homelessness. But these costs are too great to ignore. We need a national housing strategy, the recognition of housing as a human right and federal re-investment in housing.

In a country so proud of our medicare system, we often forget that factors such as housing, income, education, race and ethnicity are, more than anything, what determine our health status. When Derek’s mental health deteriorates, he can indeed access the hospital care he needs, but if providing him access to housing can help keep him get healthier, saves us money, and is the right thing to do, then why not do it for everyone?

This federal election, when we vote, we must vote for housing for all, and call on all politicians to take action now.

Ritika Goel is a family doctor in Toronto serving people experiencing homelessness and a member of Health Providers Against Poverty.

< http://www.thestar.com/opinion/commentary/2015/10/13/we-need-a-national-housing-strategy-now.html >

Tags: budget, Health, homelessness, housing, ideology, jurisdiction, participation, poverty, standard of living

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