https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2023/02/07/1153827864/this-doctor-wants-to-prescribe-a-cure-for-homelessness

This doctor wants to prescribe a cure for #homelessness
February 7, 20236:30 AM ET
Greg Rosalsky

..."Boozary and his hospital partnered with their city government and the United Way of Greater Toronto to build a new, four-story building on hospital land to provide permanent housing to those grappling with homelessness. This multimillion-dollar project, scheduled to open this summer, is essentially a form of public housing where doctors are triaging and identifying who most needs a home.

The first phase of this new program, he says, will amount to more than 50 units that will provide people with their own bathroom, kitchen, and bed. Boozary hopes to see the program scale and dramatically reduce the number of homeless people.

Boozary says it's not only a matter of social justice, but sound economics. "It could cost about $30,000 or more to have a patient on a hospital ward for a month, or nearly $7,000 to be in a sheltering system for the month versus $2,500 to $2,800 per month for supportive housing," he says.

Other hospitals in the United States that are getting into the housing business have come to a similar conclusion. "Many hospitals realize it's cheaper to provide a month of housing than to keep patients for a single night," Kaiser Health News reports. But while other hospitals have focused on providing temporary housing to homeless people, University Health Network is focusing on making permanent units.

In addition to the program aimed at providing permanent housing to homeless people, Boozary's hospital also funded a program that provided food boxes to them during the depths of the pandemic economic downturn.

"I, in my medical training, never thought that I would be prescribing food or housing," Boozary says. "This should not be the case. But that's the desperate state of poverty we're in. What would you have us do as health workers?"

Boozary is quick to point out that the programs his hospital is pursuing won't alone solve the problem of homelessness in Toronto. But he hopes his program will prove effective and scalable. At the end of the day, Boozary says, only political will and large public investments in housing and community social work will end the homeless crisis."...