An Australian geography of unhealthy housing

Abstract

This paper has focused on one of those long‐term determinants of health—housing—and it has found that the widely accepted assumption that housing in Australia is of high quality and health enabling deserves to be challenged. Just over 10 per cent of adult Australians live in accommodation that is likely to reduce their physical and mental wellbeing, adding to the burden of public health expenditures and potentially increasing the incidence of disability and long‐term ill health. Critically, those most likely to be affected by their housing were those already at risk within Australian society—for example, low‐income public tenants, young people establishing themselves, persons with a disability, the widowed, and the never married. This work was funded by the Australian Research Council (DP120102974).