Recommitting to housing and health care justice after City of Grants Pass v Johnson

Although the proximate causes of houselessness are numerous and unique to each individual’s circumstances, structural factors such as inadequate affordable housing, wealth inequality, historical redlining, and exclusionary zoning distally and synergistically drive houselessness. Consequently, clinicians and health care systems cannot address houselessness on their own. Reducing the number of PEH will ultimately require significant investments to increase the supply of affordable housing, in tandem with prevention strategies. Still, we believe that clinicians and health care systems have an important role in addressing the harms associated with houselessness and advocating for dignity-driven solutions. In this editorial, considering the recent US Supreme Court decision in City of Grants Pass v Johnson, we argue that the criminalization of houselessness adds insult to the indignity that PEH encounter and worsens preexisting health inequities associated with houselessness.

We discuss the strong link between houselessness and poor health outcomes; the legal aspects of criminalizing houselessness; the need for clinicians and health care systems to partner in identifying houseless individuals and connecting them to available permanent supportive housing through relationships with community-based organizations; and innovative strategies, including Housing First approaches.