The National Nurse-Led Care Consortium (NNCC) and the Opportunity Starts at Home (OSAH) multi-sector affordable homes campaign published on February 20, companion articles about the intersections of the health and housing sectors. Kristine Gonnella, senior director of strategic initiatives at NNCC, published “Housing is Health in 2020, The Year of the Nurse” on OSAH’s website. In turn, Mike Koprowski, national director of OSAH, published “Nurse Leaders ARE Housing Advocates” on NNCC’s website. NNCC, the leading advocate for nurse-managed health care, participates on the OSAH campaign’s Roundtable along with 83 other organizations from many sectors.
“Across the country, more in the healthcare sector are beginning to recognize the importance of stable, affordable homes to the health of their patients,” writes Ms. Gonnella. “Unfortunately, the nation is in the grips of an unprecedented housing affordability crisis in which wages for the lowest income people have stagnated while rents continue to climb. A lack of stable, affordable housing is a public health concern and one that the nursing community has a longstanding commitment to address.”
“Every day, nurse leaders see first-hand the harmful health impacts of unstable and unaffordable housing on their patients,” writes Mr. Koprowski. “Therefore, they are uniquely positioned to weigh in on housing policy issues and join in the advocacy to make homes affordable for low-income people. Housing advocates and healthcare professionals must recognize that their fates are intertwined and work shoulder-to-shoulder to advance research-based housing solutions. That is exactly what we are doing through Opportunity Starts at Home.”
Ms. Gonnella’s article is here and Mr. Koprowski’s article is here.
The National Nurse-Led Care Consortium website is at: https://nurseledcare.phmc.org
The Opportunity Starts at Home campaign website is at: http://www.opportunityhome.org