CSH Statement on Dobbs v. Jackson Ruling
Housing and Healthcare Must Be Person-Centered
CSH advances supportive housing, the combination of affordable housing with support services that help people and families live with stability, autonomy, and dignity. Healthcare, like housing, is an irrefutable basic human right and core to the support services provided in supportive housing. As such we are called to issue this statement regarding the recent U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson. The ruling narrows the provision of accessible healthcare for individuals and families, including those with complex (health, economic and social) challenges, stripping individuals and families of options they could choose to live with stability, autonomy, and dignity. Our work and mission is also inextricably linked to advancing equity as homelessness, lack of access to affordable housing, the overreliance on institutional settings such as the justice sector, and emergency public systems, is disproportionally experienced by Black, Indigenous and People of Color. The Dobbs ruling will exacerbate inequities and reinforce patterns of institutional racism that will have a disproportionate and deleterious impact on individuals of color and low-income families.
CSH also steadfastly believes that services – especially health and housing – must be person centered. This ruling sets a dangerous precedent that shifts personal care decisions from the individuals to institutions. This is antithetical to our belief. It is for these reasons that CSH calls on the U.S. Congress and state legislatures to act immediately to preserve reproductive healthcare for all individuals.
