COVID-19 shone light to the problems of shared health environments — part 2
Cowritten by Alessandro Paone
This 2 part blog condenses the research of Alessandro Paone and Pinja Piipponen’s MA degree project (RCA, Service Design, 2020). Their project Household Health explores the topic of shared health environments and flat sharing in the new normal.
Visit www.rcaservicedesign.com/projects/household-health for more.
2. Household Health and Individual’s Responsibility
Freedom of choice, movement, and the right to health
During these past months we continuously talk about the health of the public — public healthcare and the NHS, who are working hard to keep the nation running and people healthy. Before the pandemic we spoke of the government’s responsibility to provide healthcare to its citizens, but the focus has turned to focusing on the actions of the individual.
The citizens now have new government coordinated “duties to the community”: infection prevention measures to keep other people safe. We need to stay home and now alert, save lives and protect the NHS. Without these “community duties” we cannot avert the crisis.
All of us have a right to health; it is a human right. While protecting this right and the public’s health, states have resorted to a never-before-seen extent of limiting other rights we have: the freedom of movement, among others. After the government’s decision to lock us inside our homes, we have seen ripple effects of behaviors and unintended consequences, such as the terrifying rise of domestic violence and mental health problems. The disproportion of affected communities has been a powerful reminder of our different health and socioeconomic levels and where we come from and that the work that we do has a huge impact on the safety and wellbeing of a person.
Household Health and the downside to sharing
Have we talked enough about situations where the discussion is not private or public, but collective? By household health we mean the different factors of living with other people that impact the health of the home as an entity.
The closer you are to other people, the more you are at risk. The most crucial piece of the pandemic-response scenario is implementing social distancing. The past events have revealed something that might have been ignored in many of the services — a weakness in infection prevention practices. Businesses are working hard towards figuring out how to continue their operations with a 2 meter distance between their customers as the restrictions are being lifted.
Events that took place in many care homes and prisons, speak for the worst-case scenario of how things can go terribly wrong in shared living spaces. The stories have been utterly shocking. Smaller, less life threatening consequences, but still life changing in a negative way, have been the eviction stories we have heard. Many have been evicted from student accommodations with only a week’s notice after the management realized what a full house isolation would mean in the case one resident fell ill.
“I was evicted of my shared student accommodation during the lockdown
and I was left to find a place in 7 days with no support.
It was scary, I was practically homeless. They didn’t want to take responsibility for a full isolation if one of us showed symptoms.”
- Student, 26, London
All adults maintain a complex web of relationships, and more adults living in a household means more webs intersecting and more opportunities for the virus to expand its grip. Staying 2 meters apart in these tiny Victorian corridors and kitchens is impossible.
The contrast between lock down life as a millionaire who can fly their private jet far far away from others vs a young student, who works in a supermarket, is imposed on interacting with hundreds of people a day at work and 5 more at home, is drastic. This is one of the reasons we have focused on flat sharers, living in these mixed social spiderwebs and small spaces and smaller income levels.
Shared households reveal an interesting, unique area, where the responsibility of one’s actions are in the spotlight, without any authority supervising what happens behind these closed doors. Before this disease, the risk of your flatmate harming your health was lower and mainly circulated around food safety, smoking and the general hygiene, but now that there is a fast spreading disease with no cure, what will need to change? How is the right to health protected in home environments?
There is already a prediction of the increase of private car ownership, because of the rising fear of using public transport after the lockdown is lifted. The same thought is applicable for housing — many are already planning to move as far from their flat mates as they can. But what about those who cannot afford distancing themselves? How can they feel safe at home now and in the future?
Clashing ways of coping and preventing diseases
Many are not able to have a say in who they live with, especially tenants living in houses in multiple occupancy, HMOs. Strangers sharing a home might have completely different ways of coping under pressure, working different jobs that have varying risks, and belong to the risk groups without the others even knowing.
To understand the different combinations of extreme behaviors that might occur within a single flatshare, we condensed our interviews to 4 behavioral extreme profiles. These types are flexible, and a person might move from one to another as time passes and the situation changes. Some might aim to control everything they can to treat their fear (Anxious Do-It- Alls), causing another flatmate, who’d rather ignore the matter (Stubborn Ignorers) to get annoyed with the fuss.
“ I’m young and healthy, why would I worry, it’s just the flu.
No one can make me wear a mask.”
- Designer, 36, London
Washing your hands is pointless if the others are not doing it right. Both the over- and under-doer have their reasons, but how do they agree on the right level of action amidst this infodemia of different guidelines? To be and feel safe, the focus comes down to the ability to discuss and agree on things, which is often avoided out of fear of harming the atmosphere of the home. No one wants to be the “control freak” or “the nag”.
“ I have to protect my flatmate to protect my health,
that’s why I’m making sure we all wear masks when we go out.
If they didn’t have their own masks, I would share from my stash.”
- Student, 24, London
We have a new social responsibility of hand washing and social distancing, and it needs to expand to the home environment too. The infection prevention practices of shared homes need to be innovated and implemented, to keep the residents and the affordable living options safe now, and in the future.
What are these new responsibilities that are not yet defined? When you move in with someone and share not just spaces but the bacteria and viruses you carry with you, is losing some of your freedom to protect the health of others reasonable? Do we have to be more protected against disease the closer we live with other people? Where is the balance between the right to make decisions of one’s own behavior vs. the health of the people you live with?
In scenarios such as the pandemics, when the cause and effect of health is highly dependent on what the residents of a flat do rather than how safe the home is itself, is there a need for a new agreement between the tenants themselves? We think there is a need for a way to agree on best practices and collaboratively shape the new normal of safer co-living.
Get in touch!
To answer to some of these questions, a service called Household Health was created to support tenants in decision making and coming to an agreement on common health actions. Visit the website for more information and book a meeting with the designers:
www.rcaservicedesign.com/projects/household-health
pinja.piipponen@network.rca.ac.uk
