11/7/16

Dear President,

Do you know what the biggest problem in the United States is? According to Huffington Post, over half a million people are homeless in the United States; one quarter of them are children. Our country is among the wealthiest countries in the world, yet homelessness is a big problem. It is imperative that we help the homeless people who are just as smart, kind, and talented achieve their dreams just the way the more fortunate can. Everyone deserves the right opportunities. The more people learn about this issue, the more they can help.

Think of it: one quarter of all homeless people are children. These homeless kids have many responsibilities. Being homeless, they have to decide how they are going to get food and where they are going to sleep; kids shouldn’t have to worry about these things. The Huffington Post also claims some homeless kids don’t get the proper education. Every kid deserves to live up to their full potential and the kids not getting the right education are limited. This is bad, and unfair, because every kid deserves to learn and have the same opportunities.

Huffington Post also states kids don’t get the right healthcare. When a person is sick he or she can barely think and function, so imagine not being able to get the right medicine to heal throughout one’s whole life. This can be dangerous because they can get illnesses that can lead to long term illness. Homeless children are more vulnerable than kids with a home to get sick than kids with a home because they live on a the streets. Everyone deserves the right to have a healthy life. These kids will eventually be our future, and for our country to be better, we need everyone to have the same opportunities.

Children aren’t the only ones at risk, Huffington Post also declares that twenty to twentyfive percent of homeless of people are mentally ill, and 1 in 5 people suffer from untreated illness. This is dangerous for the mentally ill because they don’t get the right care and health care they need. Many mentally ill end up homeless because they don’t have enough money for the right care or medicine they need, or they have no one to take care of them. Many mentally ill homeless people have trouble getting money, food, shelter and a job to escape poverty. This is important because everyone deserves to have the right health care and the ability to be the best they can be, particularly those who may be damaged because of their service to our country.

Huffington Post confirms that over 57,000 veterans are homeless. The number one cause for veterans to become homeless is because of the lack of support and social isolation. After war, veterans lives have changed and they don’t know how to get back to their old life. Veterans need the right support to move on after war. Many veterans after war have PTSD. PTSD stands for post traumatic stress disorder. PTSD is a mental health condition triggered by a traumatic experience. “31 percent of veterans from Vietnam Wars, 10 percent from the Gulf War and 11 percent from the Afghanistan War have PTSD” says the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. Most veterans who have PTSD end up homeless because they can’t pay for the right medical care they need, or they become closed off and mentally ill. Many veterans joined the army to escape poverty, so when they come back home they have nothing. This is unfair that the people who fought to save our country are returning to poverty. These veterans deserve to have a safe place and food when they come home from war.

You may think that helping the homeless is not the most important issue, but the homeless people are human and they deserved to be helped. There are other important things in our country, but we need to start with our people and work our way up. Homeless people are worrying about food, money and shelter not worrying about how to make our country a better place. There could be people living on the streets who can find a cure for cancer, but we will never know if we leave these people on the streets. Amazing homeless people could be making our country better, but instead they are trying to figure out where to sleep for the night. If we don’t help these homeless people eventually they will die.

What will happen to the homeless children on the streets? What will happen to the veterans on the streets? What will happen to the mentally ill on the streets? What will happen if we leave these people on the streets? We are failing the people who need us the most.

Your Fellow Citizen,

Margo Krasowski