Health for the Homeless

By Martha Jack

The saying “an apple a day keeps the doctor away” is not true. There is so much more than merely fruit that goes into keeping one’s body and mind in top form. As hard as I try, I find it difficult to get enough sleep/vegetables/vitamins on any given day. I can’t imagine trying to stay healthy and safe without having a place to call home.
For Toronto’s homeless community, staying healthy is made more difficult at every turn. Lack of housing and food, increased poverty, limited access to doctors and medicines are just the beginning of the issues facing the health of Toronto’s homeless. According to the Street Health Report 2007, more than three quarters of Toronto’s homeless have “at least one chronic or ongoing physical health conditions,” and more than a quarter have not had access to the Ontario health care system because they don’t have an OHIP card.
Working in conjunction with The Street Health Report 2007, photographers from the National Film Board interviewed and photographed members of Toronto’s homeless community and asked them “how do you take care of your health when you don’t have a home?” The interviews with eight of the interviewees and the accompanying interviews are on display at the Church of the Holy Trinity at Yonge and Dundas streets.
On the rainy afternoon that I visited the exhibit, the wood floors and high blue-patterned ceilings reverberate with silence. It seems like an interesting place for an art exhibit – hidden away in the back corner of a church, but it is a place where the audience can be alone with their thoughts and really reflect on an issue so often ignored.
One of the things that really stuck out to me was the positivity that the subjects looked at their problems. Joe, who had been stabbed with scissors and was supposed to be on a bed rest for a year said, “I still like life, I’m pretty resilient.” I admire this resiliency when catching a mere cold sends me whining and complaining.
One of the subjects, Phil, mentioned the practical aspects of homelessness that effect his health, such as carrying a 70 lb. backpack around with him. He also mentioned that he gives whatever he can of the little he has away to people who are worse off than him. Stories like this really go beyond the statistics and the number to provide a more human picture of homelessness in our city.
The combination of the still images and audio pieces is so dramatic. By engaging both the eye and the ear, I found that my full attention was captured by the exhibit. While I may walk, head down, past homeless people on the street, each one of these people had my complete attention to tell their story.
For more multimedia exhibits on the homeless, check out these sites:

BBC No Home Project
Homeless: Six Stories, Six Cities, Six Lives
Formerly Homeless - a Canadian blog about the homeless community with tons of links