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Omar Gandhi in Halifax on June 13. Riley Smith/The Globe and Mail
Dr. Andrew Boozerly tells a fable about life and death.
“Imagine if there was a disease that took away half of people's lifespan,” the doctor said. “From a medical point of view, nothing could be more important. It would require everyone to work together.”
One such social condition is homelessness: studies have shown that chronically homeless people have half the life expectancy of the general population. But if housing isn't always considered part of healthcare, Toronto's University Health Network is aiming to change that.
This week, UHN's Gattuso Center for Social Medicine announced its housing fellowships. The first recipients are Canadian lawyer and activist Leilani Farha of the housing initiative The Shift, British architect Paul Karakcevic of Karakcevic Carson Architects (KCA), and Canadian architect Omar Ghandi. The fellows will discuss hospital facilities and policies, as well as develop broader policy recommendations.
“Homelessness is a health issue,” said Dr. Bouzali, executive director of the Gattuso Center. “Medicine has dealt with this problem with ad-hoc solutions. We need to find a different way to address it,” he added.
That's where housing experts come in: They will work with medical and research staff and UHN's Lived Experience Advisory Board to advocate for more housing options and consider specific building projects.
“We know that housing is one of the biggest determinants of health, wellbeing and opportunity,” said Karakusevic, of KCA, a highly respected firm specialising in social housing and community buildings in London.
“It's better to build it properly. I think we can design beautiful places on a budget and provide well-built housing that can really improve people's lives.”
KCA is also working with Toronto Community Housing on two projects, and he believes UHN, which owns large swaths of real estate, can expand its housing offerings — a theme that dovetails with the federal government's stated intention to repurpose public land for housing.
The fellowship is part of UHN's larger housing strategy. This summer, the centre will open a social care housing initiative, providing supportive housing for 51 people on the hospital grounds in the Parkdale neighbourhood. Residents will have access to primary and secondary medical care, as well as support services. Dr. Bouzery co-authored a recent Canadian Medical Association Journal (CMAJ) editorial on the topic.
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Gandhi hopes to use his engineering skills and construction experience to build supportive housing. Riley Smith/The Globe and Mail
Farha, a former UN special rapporteur on the right to housing, said his ministry would focus on addressing homeless camps.
“We hope to use the interdisciplinary nature of this fellowship to address the needs of people living in homeless camps across the country. This is an issue facing nearly every city in Canada that can only be solved with an all-hands-on-deck approach.”
Gandhi hopes to use his engineering skills and construction experience to build supportive housing.
“The complexity and rising costs of construction are making any kind of construction difficult,” he said.
“There are certainly solutions that involve prefabrication, modular housing and other processes, and if I don't have the answer, you can get it from the entire Canadian building community.”
Such change requires expertise in the art and economy of construction, Gandhi said. But it's also about aesthetics.
“Architecture has more than just a practical side; it also inspires people to dream.”
