Is Stressing About the Rent Making Us Sick?
The peer-reviewed academic journal Pediatrics has published a study showing a link between families who struggle to make their rent and poor health for both the adults and children in those families.
Doctors and researchers from Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Minneapolis, and Little Rock analyzed surveys of more than 22,000 families of renters with children age 4 or younger at five urban medical centers between 2009 and 2015. They looked at how many families had experienced any of three forms of housing instability: being late on rent, moving multiple times in a year, and experiencing homelessness. The study, first reported by Pacific Standard, also looked at the health of the caregivers in those families (mostly biological mothers) and their children.