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By Dennis Thompson HealthDay Reporter
health day
THURSDAY, Feb. 8, 2024 (HealthDay News) — A new study estimates that reducing homelessness by 25% could save nearly 2,000 lives lost to opioid overdoses each year.
Researchers at the University of Georgia estimate it could save 850 lives from alcohol poisoning and 540 from cocaine overdose.
Researchers said this is the first study to show that homelessness contributes to substance abuse deaths.
“One disappointment for those who conduct studies and recommend policy changes is that homelessness and the opioid crisis remain persistent,” the researcher said. david bradford, Professor at the School of Public and International Affairs, University of Georgia. “Our study shows that there is a causal effect. “Homelessness is making the opioid crisis worse.”
For the study, researchers analyzed federal data kept on homeless people between 2007 and 2017, comparing it to death certificates with drug overdose or alcohol poisoning as the cause of death.
Researchers found that even small reductions in homelessness could save lives.
For example, even a 10% reduction in homelessness could prevent more than 650 people from dying from opioid overdose, their results show.
“That’s a lot of lives,” the researcher said. Felipe Lozano-Rojas, Assistant Professor in the School of Public and International Affairs, University of Georgia. “Opioid deaths used to be a rare occurrence, but they have become increasingly prevalent.”
The researchers said evictions have increased rapidly in recent years, with the eviction moratorium lifted after the pandemic ended.
Federal data shows nearly 200,000 more people expected to become homeless in 2023 than in 2017.
The findings were published online Feb. 5 in the journal health matters,
“The increase in homelessness that we have seen since COVID-19 is probably a significant factor in the increase in opioid-related deaths that we have seen since COVID began,” Bradford said in a university news release. Have seen since.” “If you want to make progress fighting the opioid epidemic, tackling homelessness is one way to do it.”
The researchers said other studies suggest that tackling a person’s housing before addressing any addiction issues may best serve the U.S. response to the opioid epidemic.
But banning evictions isn’t the only solution, the researchers said, because landlords need to be paid so they have an incentive to provide housing.
Researchers said something as simple as stopping evictions through small claims court could help provide people with affordable housing. Another measure could include prohibiting retaliation from landlords when tenants report housing law violations.
“It took us decades to deal with this problem and it will take decades to get out of it,” Bradford said. “I hope people can learn from studies like ours that we need practical policies that aren’t puritanical or judgmental.”
“We need to invest in people who need help,” Bradford said. “If you give them a chance, they’ll surprise you, and they’ll do well.”
Source: University of Georgia, news release, February 6, 2024
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