June Is National Healthy Homes Month
Media Contact: Christopher Bloom, cbloom@nchh.org; 443.539.4154
COLUMBIA, MD (June 1, 2021) — In the U.S. today, people spend close to 90% of their time indoors. National Healthy Homes Month (NHHM), created by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s (HUD) Office of Lead Hazard Control and Healthy Homes (OLHCHH), is an outreach campaign designed to help people connect the dots between their health and their home. This year’s overarching theme, “The Power of Partnerships,” recognizes that the support of partners helps reach target audiences and broadens the range of techniques for educating communities, families, and individuals. A healthy home is important to homeowners, renters, older adults, children, and others regardless of race, income, education, or social status. National Healthy Homes Month focuses on the importance of home assessments and the impact awareness can have on your health and to empower people to make change in order to create the healthiest home possible for themselves and their family.
Currently, millions of U.S. homes have moderate to severe physical housing problems, including dilapidated structure; roofing problems; heating, plumbing, and electrical deficiencies; water leaks and intrusion; pests; damaged paint; and high radon gas levels. These conditions are associated with a wide range of health issues, including unintentional injuries, respiratory illnesses such as asthma and radon-induced lung cancer, and lead poisoning. The health and economic burdens from preventable hazards associated within home are considerable and cost billions of dollars.
National Healthy Homes Month was established to focus national attention on ways to keep people of all ages safe and healthy in their home. It is aimed at boosting awareness and understanding of what federal and local resources are available. The events planned throughout the month will serve as a public communications campaign to promote awareness and advocacy, encourage local events, and provide resources and support to drive families to take action.
HUD OLHCHH has developed a National Healthy Homes Month digital resource toolkit for 2021, which contains many online digital resources and materials to assist with building awareness and implementation at the local level. The toolkit is available for download from both HUD’s website and via NCHH’s dedicated National Healthy Homes Month webpage.
How NCHH Is Supporting National Healthy Homes Month
The National Center for Healthy Housing, a longtime HUD partner, is helping to promote National Healthy Homes Month by participating in the leadoff session in HUD’s “The Power of Partnerships” webinar series, Natural Allies: Partnering to Improve Health and the Environment Through Housing, on June 1 from 11 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. ET (register here), as well as hosting its third annual #NHHMchat on Twitter on June 23 from 3:00 to 4:00 p.m. ET. In addition, NCHH will strive not only to amplify HUD’s full suite of webinars throughout June but also to promote other events from various healthy homes partners between June 1 and June 30. A list of these events is available here; organizers seeking to have NCHH promote their events should contact Christopher Bloom, NCHH’s communications and marketing manager at cbloom@nchh.org.
For more information on National Healthy Homes Month 2021, visit HUD OLHCHH’s website.
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The National Center for Healthy Housing (NCHH) is a leading national nonprofit dedicated to transforming lives by transforming housing. Since 1992, NCHH has served as a highly regarded and credible change agent, successfully integrating healthy housing advocacy, research, and capacity building under one roof to reduce health disparities nationwide. Follow NCHH on Twitter (@NCHH), Instagram (@nchhorg), or LinkedIn, become a fan on Facebook, or subscribe to NCHH’s YouTube channel.