Homeless populations are among America’s most vulnerable to the coronavirus
People experiencing homelessness can’t self-isolate to avoid catching or transmitting the virus, which means it could spread through their communities quickly. (Pixabay/)More than half a million people living in the United States are experiencing homelessness. Every one of them is at a dramatically increased risk in this pandemic. This is true across the board: They’re more likely to catch the virus, to experience complications, and to die from it. The scope of the interventions needed to make sure this doesn’t happen is difficult to fully define, but experts say the need is immediate, and likely to get larger as we weather this crisis and the economic downturn that’s come with it. As COVID-19 sweeps across the country, forty percent of America’s homeless population could become infected with SARS-CoV-2, the novel virus that causes COVID-19, according to a recent report. This percentage would put more than 20,000 of these individuals in...