Homeless In America
Shedding Light on the Homeless Population of Los Angeles.
The White House reported in 2017 that 0.17% of the US population was homeless. However, about 7% of LA's population is homeless. California as a whole also contributes to about half of the US homeless population.
Native Americans and Pacific Islanders are the most supseptable to homelessness, African Americans and Hispanics being second most supseptable.
Many places in LA will put up structures on sidewalks and benches like spikes to prevent the homeless from sleeping there at night.
Reseach has shown that homeless people, especially those who remain unsheltered, age faster than housed people, meaning they can show physical conditions of those 15-20 years older than them. This makes the homeless population a uniquely vunerable group to COVID-19.