Homelessness Morality Study

There is not a lot data on homeless people in The Netherlands. In this article observers examine the morality of homeless people compared to the general population. Reports show that mentally homeless people are at a disadvantage than those who are not homeless. They are more prone to substance abuse and psychiatric disorders. On the other hand due to their status in society their survival rates are higher than other members of society. Evidence shows that homeless woman have more of a survival rate than their male counterparts. In order to do this study, investigators gathered information from institutions providing help for homeless people. The institution provided the investigators with each participant’s full name, sex and date of birth. The age
group of the study ranged from 20 to 24 years age. The study consisted of over 2000 people. The participants where divided into three sections “night care”, “day care” and “one day care”. Night care provides these individuals with a bed or a place to stay for the night. Day care is for individuals who used the facilities during the day to eat or look for jobs. The one-day means they stayed for only one day or night.
Investigators were able to gather this information legally from a previous study on homeless people conducted in 2001. In order to have new data and results investigators did a ten-year follow up. On the contrary researchers feel the homeless population was not carefully represented because they did not include individuals who did not use public services. A big discussion in this study was the morality rate of the general population compared to the homeless population. It was found that homeless women and men have higher morality rates than those of the general population. This was surprising because most members of society feel homeless individuals are viewed as having no morals or desire to get out of their current situation. Furthermore, morality comes with age. The older the participants were the higher their morality rates were. There have been many theories that state the life expectancy of a member of the general population is higher than a member of the homeless population. However researchers suggest that this theory is false. Life expectancy is not based on the structure of a specific population and should not be compared. The life expectancy age is
30. Thus homelessness is now associated with higher rates of life expectancy and higher morality rates. In conclusion this study aimed to measure the morality patterns of homeless people in the Netherlands by their age and sex. After the ten-year follow up there was not a drastic difference in results. In the further study morality was also proven higher in the homeless community than the general population. Likewise, the life expectancy rates in both groups stayed consistent. As a result of this researchers deem both studies are valid and reliable. However in the future investigators hope to interview both the homeless population that uses public services and the population that does not.