Homelessness In Los Angeles

Imagine walking around the streets of Los Angeles and taking in the towering buildings and the bustling traffic. People on the sidewalk passing back heading to their next appointment and cars in search of parking slots. Suddenly the world stops and you hear the rattling of coins in a can. You take your focus of the beautiful City of Angels to a man sitting man on the ground shaking his can. He sits there with a sign that says, “Homeless, please help. God bless.” People continue to walk by, but only you notice him. The world seems to be so distracted from him and blinded that they do not see his problem. As the man continues to be out of the line of sight of society so does problem. The homelessness situation is bigger than one may imagine. Like the people passing by the homeless man, the

As these homeless people are concentrated in the area of Skid row, they become a risk to public health and hygiene. According from P.A.T.H., a program of agencies fighting against homelessness, and the 2013 Greater Los Angeles Homeless Count, “58,423 individuals experience homelessness in Los Angeles on any given night” (“About Us”). In over the “past five years, more and more homeless people are being reported to contract tuberculosis, a bacterial disease that has symptoms of coughing, coughing up blood, weigh loss, night sweats, fatigue, and fever”(Lupkin). The disease is spread through the air like the common cold, so nearby homeless shelters and the area are already exposed to the bacterial strain. According to the map of the United States by the Centers for Disease Control, the tuberculosis strain is spread throughout across the nation. As more and more people continue to be infected, the disease will only continue to spread and eventually create a bigger problem. The tuberculosis disease can easily be treated with antibiotics, but the homeless lack available resources to attain the help they need like getting the tuberculosis