Housing instability has been
shown to be related to poorer health outcomes in various studies, mainly in the
USA and UK. Affected individuals are more prone to psychiatric (e.g., major
depression, anxiety) and physical disorders (e.g., hypertension). This
situation has deteriorated with the onset of the economic crisis. One of the
most affected countries is Spain, which has high rates of foreclosure and
eviction that continue to rise. In response, a civil movement, The Platform for
People Affected by Mortgages (PAH), works to provide solutions to its members
affected by foreclosure and advocates for the right to decent housing.
The aims
of this study ware to describe and compare the health status of PAH members
from Catalonia to a sample of the general population and to analyze the
association between health status and mortgage status, foreclosure stage, and
other socioeconomic variables, among members of the PAH. We conducted a
cross-sectional study using a self-administered online questionnaire (2014)
administered to 905 PAH members in Catalonia (>18 years; 559 women and
346 men). Results were compared with health indicators from The Health Survey
of Catalonia 2013 (n = 4830). The dependent variables were poor mental health
(GHQ 12 ≥ 3), and poor self-reported health (fair or poor). All analyses were
stratified by sex. We computed age-standardized prevalence and prevalence
ratios of poor mental and self-reported health in both samples. We also
analyzed health outcomes among PAH members according to mortgage status
(mortgage holders or guarantors), stage of foreclosure, and other socioeconomic
variables by computing prevalence ratios from robust Poisson regression models.
The prevalence of poor mental health among PAH members was 90.6 % in women
and 84.4 % in men, and 15.5 and 10.2 % in the general population,
respectively. The prevalence of poor self-reported health was 55.6 % in
women and 39.4 % in men from the PAH, and 19.2 and 16.1 % in the
general population, respectively. These health inequalities were independent of
socioeconomic status. The prevalence of poor mental health was higher among
individuals in the non-payment stage of foreclosure than among those who were
up to date with their payments.
In contrast, self-reported
poor health was more prominent in later stages of foreclosure, such as in
post-eviction without dation in payment stage in men.
We observed a
considerably higher prevalence of poor mental and self-reported health among
male and female PAH members than in the general population. Public policies
that tackle housing instability and its consequences are urgently needed in
Spain.
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By:
- 1Department of Experimental and Health Sciences, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona, Spain.
- 2Agència de Salut Pública de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain.
- 3Centro de Estudios para la Equidad en Salud, Universidad de La Frontera, Temuco, Chile.
- 4CIBER de Epidemiología y Salud pública (CIBERESP), Madrid, Spain.
- 5Institute of Biomedical Research (IIB-Sant Pau), Barcelona, Spain.
- 6Department of Experimental and Health Sciences, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona, Spain. cborrell@aspb.cat.
- 7Agència de Salut Pública de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain. cborrell@aspb.cat.
- 8CIBER de Epidemiología y Salud pública (CIBERESP), Madrid, Spain. cborrell@aspb.cat.
- 9Institute of Biomedical Research (IIB-Sant Pau), Barcelona, Spain. cborrell@aspb.cat.
- 10Agència de Salut Pública de Barcelona, Avinguda Lesseps 1, ES-08023, Barcelona, Spain. cborrell@aspb.cat.
- J Urban Health. 2016 Mar 3.
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