COVID-19's Impact on Vulnerable Homeless Populations

America’s cities are already experiencing a crisis of homelessness. COVID-19 is going to further stress an already overtaxed homeless assistance system.

I recently wrote (with co-authors Dan Treglia and Ken Steif from UPenn, Randall Kuhn from UCLA, and Thomas Byrne from Boston University) a paper on COVID-19 and its likely impact on the 575,00 people in the U.S. experiencing homelessness. This population is already older and more likely to have underlying health issues than the general population. Evidence suggests that it is just these populations—the elderly and those with comorbidities—that are especially susceptible to COVID-19.

The COVID-19 pandemic is likely to ravage this already vulnerable group. Our research finds that almost 22,000 people experiencing homelessness could require hospitalization, over 7,000 could require critical care, and nearly 3,500 could die. These are conservative estimates—we think they could be higher. We think these outcomes will largely reflect the distribution of the homeless population nationwide, with more cases in urban areas.

In our paper, we suggest ways to address this emerging crisis: people who are unsheltered need to be brought inside, shelters need to accommodate six feet of distance between people, and symptomatic people need to be quarantined. We estimate that this will require 400,000 more shelter beds as well as more private accommodations for those who are infected or under observation. We estimate that will cost about $11.5 billion nationally.

Dennis Culhane is Professor and Dana and Andrew Stone Chair in Social Policy, Penn School of Social Policy and Practice; Co-Principal Investigator, Actionable Intelligence for Social Policy; and a Penn IUR Faculty Fellow.

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