Thousands of people who died this year without a permanent home were memorialized on Thursday in communities across the U.S. Established in 1990, Homeless Persons’ Memorial Day is observed with prayers, candles, moments of silence and the reading of names on Dec. 21, the first day of winter and the longest night of the year.
A national gathering called “One Life, Too Many. Another Year, Too Long” took place Thursday afternoon in Washington, with a Zoom call so people could follow from afar.
A ceremony in Phoenix honored 758 homeless people confirmed to have died so far this year in Maricopa County, the most populous in Arizona and home to Phoenix, the state's largest city.
That's already a record. The Maricopa County Medical Examiner investigated 732 deaths of homeless people in 2022, representing a 42% jump in deaths from 2021.
"Without sufficient housing and services, people will continue to die on the streets,” said Lisa Glow, CEO at Central Arizona Shelter Services, which operates the state’s largest emergency shelter, a 600-bed facility in Phoenix.
DeBorah Gilbert White, the public education director for the National Coalition for the Homeless, said learning about those who died can shatter stereotypes. At one event several years ago, she learned of a 3-year-old homeless girl who died in the nation's capital.
White said that as the population grows older, more people are dying in their 60s. She noted that many with chronic conditions like diabetes don't have the necessary conditions, such as refrigeration for insulin, to care for their health.
Overall, homelessness is surging. The recent Annual Homeless Assessment Report from the Department of Housing and Urban Development showed that roughly 653,100 people in the United States were experiencing homelessness. That's a 12% overall increase over the previous year and the highest since reporting began in 2007.
“A lot of people living in encampments are uninsured and without access to medical treatment for a variety of illnesses that are exacerbated by living unsheltered,” said Etel Haxhiaj, a spokesperson for the National Healthcare for the Homeless Council.
The council supports the remembrance events to push for better tracking of the deaths.
Maricopa County is among few U.S. jurisdictions engaged in such tracking.
Drug and alcohol abuse figured into many deaths and was often the main cause. Cardiovascular events like strokes and heart attacks, followed by traffic injuries, are also common ways that homeless people die.
Many homeless people are estranged from family, which means their deaths can pass virtually unnoticed.