Housing is more than a shelter. Riflessioni intorno alla homelessness in una prospettiva globale.

Despite the difficulty of building reliable data due to the complexity of detection of the phenomenon, according to international studies no less than 150 million people, about 2% of the world population, are homeless; another 20% do not have access to “adequate” housing. The reasons are many: rapid urbanization, not availability of affordable housing, of dedicated services and facilities, poverty, unemployment, alcoholism or substance abuse, family degradation. If you then expand your gaze to global dynamics, to the causes mentioned above are added forced migration as a result of conflicts, natural disasters or complex crises. The article, assuming the house as a right and as a social determinant of health, intends to reflect on some aspects considered relevant: adequacy, temporariness, transience and permanence, minimum standards, in a comparison with approaches that are applied in the Global South.