People experiencing homelessness are filtered out of health care by ordinary requirements: an address, a phone that keeps its number, transport at a set time, somewhere to keep medication, and ID. The answer is logistics, not motivation, which means moving the delivery to the person, as street medicine does.
Nobody wrote a rule excluding people without an address from health care. The exclusion is assembled from a dozen reasonable-looking requirements, none of which was designed to do it.
What are the barriers to health care for homeless people?
- An address. To register, to receive results, to receive a bill, to be reached about anything.
- A working phone that keeps its number. Appointment confirmations, callbacks, results, the pharmacy.
- Transport at a scheduled time. Two hours out of a day, on a specific date, to a specific building.
- Somewhere to keep medication. Refrigeration, security, and a place it will still be tomorrow.
- Continuity of identity. An ID that has not been lost or stolen.
Each requirement is defensible on its own. Together they form a filter, and the filter selects against precisely the people with the most to lose.
How many people are homeless in the United States?
HUD’s point-in-time count found 745,652 people experiencing homelessness in the United States on a single night in January 2025 — 479,332 sheltered and 266,320 unsheltered.
The unsheltered number is the operationally important one. A person in a shelter has an address of a kind, a place to be reached, and someone who notices if they stop appearing. A person who is unsheltered has none of the three.
Of the total, 32,495 were veterans — 18,977 sheltered and 13,518 unsheltered, roughly four in ten unsheltered. HUD reports the veteran figure has fallen 56 percent since 2009.
How do homeless people get medical care?
The framing that gets applied to this population is about compliance — missed appointments, non-adherence, disengagement. Those are descriptions of the filter working, restated as facts about the person.
The alternative is to move the delivery rather than the patient. That is what street medicine is: basic first aid taken into camps and under bridges, interceptive care that stops small problems becoming emergencies. It is not a mobile clinic and this foundation does not describe it as one. Street medicine sits with the Valor Medica division.
The situation is singular
A veteran with untreated PTSD, a back injury and no fixed address does not have three problems. They have one situation, and dividing it among three agencies that each solve a third of it produces three partial solutions and no result.
The VA National Center for PTSD reports that about 7 in every 100 veterans will have PTSD at some point in their life, against about 6 in 100 US adults in the general population, and that the rate is higher among female veterans — 13 in 100 — than male veterans, at 6 in 100. Among veterans using VA care, one study cited by VA found 23 in 100 had PTSD at some point in their lives.
What this foundation can and cannot say
Sevadar Foundation delivers no clinical care and this post is not medical advice. What a foundation can usefully say about this is structural: the exclusion is built out of process assumptions rather than intent, which means it is fixable by changing the process. See why a foundation should not practice medicine.
If you need care, the division is the door: valormedica.org/get-help. In an emergency call 911; if you are in crisis call or text 988, and veterans can press 1 after dialing 988 for the Veterans Crisis Line.
Frequently asked questions
Why do homeless people miss medical appointments?
Mostly because the system assumes things they do not have: an address, a phone that keeps its number, transport at a set time, a safe place to keep medication, and ID. Missed appointments and “non-adherence” are usually the filter working, restated as facts about the person. The fix is logistics, not motivation.
What is street medicine?
Street medicine takes basic first aid to where people are living, into camps and under bridges, instead of asking them to come to a building. It is interceptive care: it stops small problems from turning into emergencies. It is not a mobile clinic. In this foundation, street medicine sits with the Valor Medica division.
Why are unsheltered people the hardest to reach for care?
A person in a shelter has an address of a kind, a place to be reached, and someone who notices if they stop showing up. A person who is unsheltered has none of the three. HUD counted 266,320 unsheltered people in the United States on a single night in January 2025, out of 745,652 experiencing homelessness.
Where can a homeless veteran get help?
Start with Valor Medica at valormedica.org/get-help. Sevadar Foundation itself delivers no clinical care, so the division is the door. In an emergency, call 911. If you are in crisis, call or text 988; veterans can press 1 after dialing 988 to reach the Veterans Crisis Line.
Sources
Every figure on this page is traceable. Where a source is a government report, the year the data describe is named alongside it, because it is usually not the year of publication.
- U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Office of Community Planning and Development. The 2025 Annual Homeless Assessment Report (AHAR) to Congress, Part 1: Point-in-Time Estimates of Homelessness. Figures describe a single night in January 2025. huduser.gov
- U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. “Veteran homelessness continues downward trend,” VA News, June 25, 2026. news.va.gov
- U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, National Center for PTSD. How Common is PTSD in Veterans? Page last updated March 26, 2025. ptsd.va.gov