COVID-19 and rough sleepers: a randomised controlled trial to evaluate models of housing and support to reduce infection and homelessness

作为政府应对COVID-19的一部分，15，000名露宿者现已在英格兰获得独立的临时住所，主要是在酒店。这一方法涉及为露宿者重新安置宿舍、庇护所和类似的共用设施，是一种短期应对措施。当封锁结束时，需要决定如何安置前露宿者，以符合英国政府防止人们重返街头的承诺--包括可能重新开放庇护所类型的住所。现有的共用设施的临时住所可能使人们无法遵守政府的社交距离建议。因此，这些决定将影响COVID-19第二波感染的风险，并可能影响任何突变。该提案概述了一个独特的时间有限的机会，在英国进行有史以来第一次随机对照试验，评估永久性房屋对新型冠状病毒风险的成效和成本效益-19感染和住房稳定的人经历无家可归。许多无家可归的人目前正在等待住房意味着他们可以随机分配到不同的住房解决方案的规模快从永久性住房的短期影响中得出的见解可用于为其他地方当局应对COVID-19挑战以及更广泛的住宿替代方案的成本效益提供信息。

As part of the government's response to COVID-19, 15,000 rough sleepers have now been offered self-contained temporary accommodation in England, mainly in hotels. This approach, which has involved the decanting of hostels, shelters and similar shared provision for rough sleepers, is a short-term response.When the lockdown ends, decisions will need to be taken about how to house former rough sleepers in line with the UK government's commitment to prevent people from going back to the streets - including, potentially, through the re-opening of shelter-type accommodation. Existing temporary accommodation with shared facilities might make it impossible for people to comply with government social distancing advice. So these decisions will impact on the risk of a second wave of infection from COVID-19 and possibly any mutations.This proposal outlines a unique time limited opportunity to conduct the first ever randomised controlled trial in the UK, to evaluate the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of permanent housing on the risk of COVID-19 infection and housing stability for people experiencing homelessness.That many homeless people are currently waiting to be housed means they can be randomly allocated to different housing solutions at scale quickly. The insights drawn from the short-term impacts of permanent housing can be used to inform other local authorities' responses to the challenges of COVID-19 and the cost-effectiveness of accommodation alternatives more broadly.