Housing Conditions and Health: A review of literature

The purpose of this Report is to review and summarize the scientific literature that addresses the relationship between housing conditions and health. An earlier review of the relationship between housing and health was conducted by the Northern Health Research Unit in 1991. This report interprets the results of the previous review with more recent studies. The review is based on articles available through a search of several scientific databases including Medline, Healthstar, Sociofile, and Social Science Abstracts. The paper also includes an exhaustive search of all published and unpublished case studies (including dissertations, consultants’ reports and government papers) dealing with housing and health in Native communities in Canada. In addition, a few studies from U.S.A. Indian reservations and Greenland were also consulted and reported.