HOME = Health

Physical safety is one of the most obvious benefits of having a safe and secure home.

Clean, warm housing provides protection from the elements and helps prevent illness and diseases such as tuberculosis, diarrhoea, and malaria. Families who live in a properly constructed home are less likely to fall prey to such diseases and are better equipped to recover from any illnesses they may contract.

It goes without saying that the mental health of individuals and families is greatly improved when physical health concerns are taken away.

Seventy-year-old Girma Mihiretu and his wife Yeshi Ali, can testify to this. The couple live with their three-year-old grandson, Zehirun Asefa, in Dessie, Ethiopia, but for a long time they and their six children had just a single plastic sheet to call home.

With no sanitation or proper protection from the weather, the family were at the mercy of the elements.

As Mihiretu recalls,

“I lived in a small and dirty house. We didn’t have a toilet. We couldn’t help our children with money. We were suffering. Our children’s health suffered.”

To make matters even worse the couple used to suffer with leprosy, and even today bear the scars of this debilitating disease. Life was desperate, until just two years ago when the couple became Habitat for Humanity homepartners and began to hope for a healthier future.

The couple’s only money used to come from begging, but now they have a garden to cultivate crops that they sell to supplement their income.

“Today, we see our new house and know it’s good for our children,” beams Mihiretu. “This house has a toilet and a garden. Thank you, Habitat for Humanity.”

Across the world Habitat for Humanity is helping to construct decent stable housing to give families a safe home and a good life. By sponsoring a home, you can help even more families to step into a new life full of health, hope and opportunity.