We all deserve to live in a safe and healthy home.
Yet some children are still exposed to high levels of lead and asthma triggers such as mold and secondhand smoke. That can lead to lifelong health problems.
APHA supports innovative approaches to ensuring everyone has a healthy home. We believe in working with the housing sector to create equitable and healthy households for future generations. The resources on this page give additional information on the links between public health, housing and health care financing for healthy homes.
Creating the Healthiest Nation: Health & Housing Equity (PDF)
This APHA report:
- demonstrates how structural racism — particularly through policies — led to the current state of housing inequality in America;
- examines how biased policies impacted housing affordability, quality, safety and stability and resulted in disparate impacts to certain groups; and
- outlines numerous ways to advance change in housing equity via policy, cross-sector partnerships and community engagement.
Healthy Housing Standard
The National Center for Healthy Housing and APHA created the National Healthy Housing Standard, a health-focused property maintenance policy, for property owners, advocates, elected officials, public health leaders and others who recognize the impact housing has on community health. APHA recently released two case studies featuring two cities who have integrated healthy home provisions into their city code — Tukwila, Washington, (PDF) and Dallas, Texas(PDF).
Health Care Financing for Healthy Homes
The NCHH, with support from APHA, published "Findings from Case Studies in Healthcare Financing of Healthy Homes Services" (PDF). This white paper is part of a multiyear project to document and demystify the landscape and opportunities surrounding health care financing for healthy homes services. As part of these efforts, NCHH published case studies to increase understanding of opportunities for health care financing of healthy homes services: