Healthabitat » Environmental Health & Design

We work with local communities to improve their homes for better health.

Our data and knowledge show that small repairs and improvements to the mechanics of a house can make a significant impact.

Housing for Health

The primary focus of Healthabitat’s work are Housing for Health projects. We work with poor people. We work in the places they live, and the work is done to improve their health. It improves the parts of their physical environment that are needed to keep people healthy.

About Housing For Health

Safety and the Nine Healthy Living Practices

Housing for Health projects are guided by Safety and the 9 Healthy Living Practices (HLP’s). These principles are derived from local, national and international health research.

These 9 goals are ordered in priority of health impact. After safety, the most important goal is washing people especially children aged 0-5 years old.

Learn About Safety and the 9 HLPs

Lack of routine maintenance

Our work focuses on improving “health hardware” or the physical equipment needed to ensure housing and environments support good health.

74% of our work is due to lack of routine maintenance. 19% of the things we fix are due to faulty construction, while just 7% is caused by damage/misuse.

Why we do the work

Improved house function

The link between a poor living environment and poor health has been long established, we know that increased house function = reduced chance of infectious disease.

We test and check and fix 250 items in every house. This work is put into a database to prioritise jobs to maximise health improvement and measure the impact our work makes.

For example, we know that nationally a Housing for Health project will improve working showers from 38% to 88%.

See our results

How to reduce poverty? Fix homes! The late Paul Pholeros at TEDx Sydney

News stay up-to-date with HH...

RESEARCH: RE-ITERATING the social determinants of health

29/11/2024

Central Australian researchers chose to re-iterate rather than revolutionise. This work reminds us that the health ‘gap’ between First Nations and non-First Nations Australia is fundamentally driven by the social…

Australia

RESEARCH: CSIRO’s 2024 State of the Climate report released

20/11/2024

This State of the Climate report shows aspects on Australia’s climate, global climate and projected future changes. The findings and outlook are scary. Observations, reconstructions of past climate and…

Australia

NEWS: MoU signed showing housing is a critical health priority

18/10/2024

Menzies School of Health Research (Menzies) and Aboriginal Housing Northern Territory (AHNT) have signed an MoU. The MoU formalises a collaborative partnership to improve the quality of remote Aboriginal housing…

Australia

RESEARCH: Thermal Imaging in community hands

On recent Housing for Health projects we have been using thermal imaging to reveal how houses are performing. The community teams have been very interested in the technology and using…

Temperature Control

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We acknowledge the Traditional Custodians of the lands on which we work and their connections to land, sea and community. We pay our respects to Elders past and present, and acknowledge the crucial role Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have in Housing for Health’s work to improve health through better housing.