...Homeless LGBT Youth Patricia Lynard Literature Review SOWK 469 Applied Social Work Research Kofi Danso, Instructor Minnesota State University, Mankato March 6, 2013 Background/Intervention Someone who identifies as homeless LGBT youth is someone who fits into three categories combine. Firstly, they are young usually between the ages of 13-17 years of age. They are also homeless which loosely describes a person without a regular dwelling. There are several reasons why someone may become homeless; some examples include financial difficulties or family problems that force someone out of their home. The last category is an individual who identifies as lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender (LGBT). It is estimated that people who identify as LGBT make up 20% of the homeless population (Van Leeuwen, Boyle, Salomonsen-Sautel, Baker, Garcia, Hoffman, & Hopfer, 2006). When these categories are combined the individual is considered homeless LGBT youth, which is the focus of this literature review. The interventions for homeless LGBT youth are limited, but they can access local homeless shelters they however run the threat of being harassed by other people using the facilities for their sexual orientation. There a few organizations designed to help the homeless LGBT youth these interventions provide emergency housing for LGBT youth who have either been thrown out or have run away from their homes (Rosario, Schrimshaw, & Hunter, 2012). Purpose The purpose of this literature...
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...McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act of 1987, if a person lacks a fixed, regular, or adequate nighttime residence the person is then considered homeless. The National Alliance to End Homelessness reported that on a single night in January 2015 564,708 people in the United States were considered homeless, meaning they had no place to sleep. In the 1870s the issue of homelessness in America emerged causing many homeless people to live in urban cities. In the 1930s this issue worsened due to the Great Depression, causing poverty and more than two million people were homeless and in search of work. The homeless...
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...Homeless Populations HN200 1. In your text on pages 206-207, the author discusses his research on the homeless population. He refers to the many routes one can take to become homeless. Choose two populations from his list that you might work with in your career as a human services professional. Describe two possible interventions or tasks that you might be involved with in working with each population. What are some of the general skills a human services professional might need to work with these population? Our text illustrates that there are various populations within the homeless community. These people are homeless for different reasons, whether its voluntary or involuntarily. Runaways and Victims of environmental catastrophes are two homeless populations that I may have to work with in my career as a human services professional. According to the National Runaway Safe line, “Between 1.6 and 2.8 million youth run away in a year”. Children runaway for different reasons, these reasons may include abuse at home, a new step parent, birth or death in the family, problems at school or even peer pressure. Unfortunately running to the streets may create a greater problem for this population. Many runaways turn to drugs to help cope with the day to day life and stress of living on the streets. Money is not easy to come by so they will begin to steal, rob and even prostitute. As a human services professional I would get to know the Runaway as far as their...
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...Homeless persons BSHS/302 - INTRODUCTION TO HUMAN SERVICES In 1948, the United Nations passed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Article 23 states, “Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control.” However, shockingly there are between five and six hundred thousand people that are considered to be homeless today. This means they do not have a permanent, safe, or affordable place to live. Due to the rising costs of housing and lower wages for skilled workers or the lack of demand of work, people going homeless is rapidly becoming a problem. Also there are many other reasons why people are homeless, such as family breakdown or a natural disaster. In earlier times homeless people were typically blamed for their own circumstances or they were considered to be lazy, a drunk, or a criminal. During the Great Depression, beliefs about the homeless were changed. During the depression people were faced with hard times. Millions of people lost their jobs and homes, and those who still had a job struggled just to make ends meet. In the 1960s, mentally ill patients being discharged by the masses, also known as deinstitutionalization, were sent out to live on the...
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...RUNNING HEAD: Mental Illness & the Homeless Mental Illness & the Homeless Shannon Nolen 7-21-11 I have lived in many cities and visited many cities where there are a lot of homeless people. I have sometimes wondered how these people get into the situation of not having anywhere to go. I also see a lot of these people talking to themselves and I have always thought they were just on drugs which a lot of them probably are but now that I have learned more about mental illness it is very difficult to determine whether mental illness is a cause or an effect of homelessness. There is research showing that “It is thought that approximately 25 to 33 percent of the homeless population suffers from some form of mental illness” (Townsend). This number is shocking to me and made me wonder why this is? Some of the following theories have been proposed: the deinstitutionalization movement of the 50’s and 60’s, the growing number of war veterans suffering from post traumatic stress disorder, cuts in government entitlement programs for the mentally ill and substance abuse (Townsend). As nurses we have a very important role in treating the mentally ill homeless patient. We have to be able to recognize the signs and symptoms of mental illness, evaluate whether or not they are taking medications and receiving the right kind of treatment, and if they aren’t we need to guide them in the right direction for getting treatment and provide resources...
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...Homeless and Incarceration HOMELESS AND INCARCERATION Homelessness is the problem that influences the life of the whole society. It is critical for the United States and as almost half a million of citizens do not have their own houses. They do not have the opportunities that the representatives of the general public have and cannot afford even some basic needs. Homeless individuals have to break the law and commit crimes, such as stealing food, even though they do not intend to do so, which leads to mass incarceration. This influences their behavior and increases the chances of becoming drug or alcohol addicts, which makes homeless individuals even more likely to become incarcerated. People who are imprisoned, often have no or underpaid job that does not provide these people with money enough to have a decent residence, which makes them a vulnerable population (Johnson 2015). It is important to consider what makes homeless people commit crimes that result in imprisonment. The information from various articles received during the literature review, I will reveal the connection between homelessness and incarceration, emphasizing the history that lead to their occurrence as well as the main causes of both problems. I will point out and explain the correlations between homelessness and crime rates, as well as its connections to the mental disorders, substance abuse, and chronic health condition in the context of how homeless lifestyle can be related to the incarceration...
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...family, anything will help. His eyes stare at the ground as he shamefully holds the piece of cardboard. His family stands behind him with nothing but fear in their eyes. We see people like this almost every day, either on our commute to work or school, to the local grocery store, or even just on our way home. So many times we convince ourselves that somebody else will help them. We make our selves believe that the next person to drive by them will help them out; that we don’t have the time, but somebody else will. This is the problem. Why is Homelessness an issue? Despite Washington's recovering economy, homelessness is on the rise. An estimated 25,000 residents are without shelter on any given night. There are many circumstances that may cause one to be homeless. Living a homeless lifestyle does not occur to one “type” of person but more so, I believe, is the outcome to a series of decisions and outcomes. Some of the outcomes that may have led these individuals to their current situation could be: Loss of income, inflation, misdiagnosed mentally ill patients, practicing poor health, as well as the uneducated and untreated drug and alcohol dependent individuals. Homelessness destroys families and communities, undermines morale, contributes to crime, creates drag on the economy, and also prevents people who used to live normal lives from doing normal things like getting an education and having the ability to be healthy. Homelessness is not only a problem of social policy, but...
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.... South Africa South Africa, a country on the southern tip of Africa, has an area of 471,442sq mi and a population of 44,188,000. It is predominately a black ethnicity with 76% of the population. Although South Africa is Africa's most developed country, most of the black people - rural and urban - are poor, with low standards of living. South Africa has vital natural resources such as diamonds and gold and is rich in other resources such as coal, chromite, copper, iron ore, manga- nese, platinum, phosphate rock, silver, uranium and vanadium (South Africa, 2008). It is obvious that South Africa can sustain their economy through these resources. Through the centuries South Africa has faced difficult time since the Dutch came in 1600’s, in 1700 they started importing slaves establishing the dominance of white over non- whites in the region. The non-whites faced discrimination for years under apartheid and political corruption ran by the whites. Today things look better for the people of South Africa, but they still have many obstacles to overcome. Although South Africa has overcome many travesties throughout the years, their reasonably new democracy faces more with complex political parties, recent struggles with homelessness, and what is being done about this situation. Firstly, apartheid is an “Afrikaans word literally meaning apartness,” refers to the policy of racial segregation and its concomitant economic and political discrimination that was adopted by the South...
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...testing of getting a drug approved. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) require that a drug be tested on healthy humans to make sure it is safe for use. This creates a problem though because a reasonable individual will not take an unapproved drug unless they are substantially compensated. To combat this issue, pharmaceutical companies started testing unapproved drugs on homeless people in exchange for money and other benefits. Eli Lilly started to use this approach in the 1980s and discovered that homeless male alcoholics desperate for money would take unapproved drugs for payments of up to $4,500 a month, a warm bed, food, and good medical care. To make sure that these individuals are not exploited, the FDA requires that individuals participating in these tests give their “informed consent” and make a “truly voluntary and uncoerced decision.” (P. No. 73). This creates an ethical issue because people question whether being broke, homeless, and an alcoholic can have an effect on making an uncoerced decision. On the other hand, people would argue that these homeless men were given the chance to become addiction free, they would receive other benefits, and they were helping to get a drug approved that could be used to potentially save thousands of lives. This is a complex case involving an ethical issue, but the utilitarianism theory and rights theory can be applied to...
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...Homeless in Prince William County Introduction and background: Homelessness is one of our nation’s most misunderstood and vexing social problems. Many individuals of all races struggle with the devastating effects of homeless including families with children, single adults, teenagers and the elderly. This is an issue that can be defined as living in unsuitable, unsafe and overcrowded environment. “On a single night in January 2013, there were 610,042 people experiencing homelessness in the United States, including 394,698 people who were homeless in sheltered locations and 215,344 people who were living in unsheltered locations” (Henry & Cortes, 2013). This shows homelessness in American is a crisis, many more individuals become homeless everyday. They struggle moving from place to place, night after night, in constant state of fear and survival. People become homeless for a variety of reasons. Homelessness is primarily an economic problem, and is also affected by a number of political and social factors. Economic factors include the lack of affordable housing, “housing costs have risen steadily across the country, and they have skyrocketed in many areas. Further, the inability to afford housing is concentrated among households with incomes below the poverty level, whose members account for the vast majority of people entering homelessness” (Burt, 2001). The growing gap between wage earnings and the cost of housing leaves millions of families and individuals unable...
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...As the world hungers for the love and presence of God there are people that are homeless and hungry. I take drives in the early morning on the weekends frequently into downtown Denver in Colorado where I live and I see our streets crowded with homeless people. As I drive I observe many sitting on the ground in the cold weather, their clothes are ripped and dirty. Beside them is either a grocery cart full of items that they have collected from the trash or bags packed with clothes, food, and other items that they have collected from the homeless shelters or the trashcan that they rummaged through to eat to survive. I noticed some just sit there with a blank stare on their faces wondering off into the distance with their mind. Some are trading the collectibles that to them are of...
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...Universal Health Care Tamesha Mallard Comm/215 10-01-12 Jennifer Benoist Do you have health insurance? There are millions of people in the United States that would say no. The people that do not have health insurance are not just the homeless or unemployed, but they are the working class too. That means it could be you, your neighbor or even your co-worker that is uninsured. “Nearly 44 million Americans — about 15 percent of the U.S. population — have no health coverage, including 8.5 million children. And eight out of 10 uninsured Americans are in working families (Leydig)”. All citizens of the United States should have health care insurance, because multiple countries have universal healthcare, it will help detect life threatening diseases, and decrease financial hardship. As citizens of the United States, we all have rights; we have the right to bear arms, we have the right to a public trial, and we should have the right to health coverage. First of all, all countries should provide health care insurance to their citizens. The countries that do provide health insurance to all of their citizens call it Universal health care coverage. “Nearly 50 countries have attained universal or near-universal health coverage by 2008, according to the International Labor Organization. Several well-known examples exist like the UK, which has the National Health Service, and the Canadian public health care system. (Park, 2012)” Our country is already torn and divided by financial...
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...2016 Homelessness Affecting One Minority Greater Than Others “An individual may be considered to be homeless if that person is ‘doubled up’ a term that is refers to a situation where individuals are unable to maintain their housing situation” (National Health Care for the Homeless Council). This problem has affected people in different parts of the nation. Though this ‘ doubled up’ is a term used to refer to all homeless people, this category contains many different demographics. Some of these include: families, singles, males, females and members of different races. The problem is homelessness seems to be affecting one minority larger than other subgroups. Recent perspectives of homelessness...
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...“Afghanistan hits record high in opium crop this year” and it’s become so repetitive, I’ve gotten to the point where I roll my eyes and ask, ‘When isn’t it?’. Then last year, I came across another TIMES article, again about opium in Afghanistan. Just as I was about to sigh in exasperation, I saw the title, “U.S. Troops Leave Widows Jobless”. The article takes a bit of a different view on things. It details the events where soldiers from the United States enter Afghan poppy fields and destroy them which, of course, leaves the owners of the poppy fields void of income. In many cases, widows cannot get another job and they fail to gather enough money to feed the children; the result is starvation. As I was reading the article, I found that I empathised with the widow to the point where I knew that if I were that soldier, I would not be able to destroy those poppy fields. However, would my empathy-borne actions eventually be beneficial? Would they truly be ethical? In 2005, 70% of the acute drug deaths were thanks to opioids. Meanwhile, opium production is still increasing in Afghanistan, up to a 6,400 ton increase in 20014. Thus from this dilemma, I formed the knowledge question, “To what extent can we rely on empathy to make ethical decisions?”. This knowledge question highlights how one should make morally-correct choices in any situation, whether it be at war or debating whether we should donate $5 to the homeless man or not. I will investigate this knowledge question through two...
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...are not regular people. The reason I choose homelessness is because I know of someone with a child that lost her job and is about to be evicted from her apartment. The purpose of this paper is to examine different groups of homeless people and different neighborhood characteristics. We examined the complexities of physical and social environment surrounding people living on the street and in shelters. A better way to understand these environment is to use census data as indicators of social, economic, and housing conditions...
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