Young people who experience homelessness, in Australia and in other western contexts (US, Canada, England), are widely perceived to use and abuse alcohol and drugs. The available research indicates that homeless young people use all drug types, whether injected or otherwise, more frequently than their home‐based peers. Debate exists in the research and policy literature about whether drug use is a cause or consequence of homelessness. In a study exploring homeless young peoples reasons for leaving home, we examined the relationship between young people's drug use and their pathways into homelessness. Brief qualitative interviews were conducted with 302 homeless young people (12–20 years). Following a thematic analysis of interview transcripts, four pathways into homelessness involving personal or familial drug use were identified. One‐third of the participants indicated that personal or familial drug use was a critical factor in them leaving home. Of these, just over half indicated that personal drug use was a direct or indirect cause of their homelessness and one‐quarter indicated that familial drug and alcohol use was the critical factor that led them to leaving home. One‐quarter indicated that their drug use only began after they became homeless. Family conflict, if not family breakdown, was implicated in all four pathways out of home.
This paper reports on an ethnographic exploration of gay men who inject drugs in Melbourne, Australia's second largest city, and demonstrates a further diversification of gay men's lives, characterized previously as living in a "post AIDS" era (Dowsett 1996a). It suggests that gay community plays a crucial part in some men's accounts of drug use and shapes their experience of drug injection. Injection remains an abject act, which the gay community is reticent to discuss, with consequences for gay men's health, HIV/AIDS, hepatitis C, sex, and gay community. The reticence positions drug taking (particularly drug injection) as an individual issue and as a violation of practices of self care that results both from gay men's culture of drug use and from the experience of otherness reported by gay injectors. This paper explores emerging paradoxes for gay men in relation to sex, drugs, relationality, sociality, community, and health.
Families are the fastest growing segment of homeless populations in resource-rich countries; most are female-headed. We report on women's experiences of being homeless with their children in Victoria, Australia, emphasising their mental health. Twelve women (who between them had daily responsibility for 31 children) were interviewed, revealing complex pathways into homelessness; the two main contributors were economic decline and domestic violence, with drug use and poor mental health making lesser contributions. Homelessness appeared to have adverse effects on women's wellbeing, mental health and ontological security. There was evidence of structural barriers to good mental health being inherent in the system designed to support them, with no provision for prevention or early intervention, and limited capacity for providing residential stability. Women wanted to live somewhere that was stable, secure and safe, for themselves and their children.
Some young people who have been homeless during their secondary schooling manage to obtain a university place. These young people, and others who become homeless during their university courses, have the opportunity to build a sustainable exit from homelessness through education and support. Very little is known about how many young Australians are in this situation, or what can be done to assist them to complete their degrees. This article reports on research that aimed to document the experiences of 11 university students who had experienced homelessness. The research focussed on the difficulties that these young people faced, and the types of environments and service responses that can make a difference for them. The students were part of a larger study of a foyer-type service. The research found that these young people took longer than the standard duration to complete their degrees. Their study was facilitated by provision of stable, safe accommodation and support when they were acutely homeless, relief from other pressures such as family conflict, protection while maturing, time for overseas born including refugee young people to develop language, skills, and resources, support to heal from past damaging experiences and improve their health, assistance to gain entry to preferred university courses, and pathways into stable housing for the duration of their study.
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