News

Sunday 12 September saw another edition of the “20 K of Brussels”. It was a day of conviviality, full of challenges, but especially a display of solidarity.

Easily find your way as a homeless person to a free public toilet or drinking fountain in Brussels. That is the aim of the city plan "Fountains with drinkable water and free toilets", which we publish this year for the 10th time.

During the entire month of June they challenge their employees to collect 1000 km of sport per team. Walking, cycling, hiking, as long as they move!

The November 2020 census, organized by Bruss'Help, shows that the number of homeless people in Brussels rose from 4,380 in 2018 to 5,313 in 2020, an increase of 21%. This was the sixth census since 2008, and the numbers have never stopped increasing. In this opinion article, we propose 4 essential pillars for the implementation of a Global Plan to End Homelessness.

On this “International Nurses' Day”, we would like to put the spotlight on our colleagues for the extraordinary work they have done every day for the past 15 years with homeless people.

A new project by Street Nurses investigates whether animals can be used to facilitate contact with homeless people.

As you may have noticed, homeless people often have a dog with them. This four-legged friend is very important to its owner: it offers protection, of course, but most of all, its presence offers comfort and affection that makes the difficulties of street life a little easier to bear.

Encouraging formerly homeless people to get on with their lives and become so attached to their new home that they will never want to leave. This is, in a nutshell, the mission of the "My Way" project that we launched at the beginning of the year.  The aim is clear: to ensure that our patients never fall back on the streets again.

The Follow-up is the second step for our patients towards stable and sustainable reintegration into housing. It consists of intensive accompaniment for the person; it is the core of our work. It starts on the street and continues until the patient is reintegrated into housing, where he or she will still benefit from the support of the professionals and volunteers of Street Nurses, on a regular but spaced basis.

2020 was for everybody a strange and difficult year but even more so for homeless people. This “lockdown year” has at least put the spotlight on the consequences of homelessness, especially in Brussels and Liège.

This brought up the question as to when we could let our patients go. Under what conditions? Following which procedure?

Joséphine has been working for six years as a nurse in the non-profit organization "Street Nurses". She tells us about her daily work.

When quarantine started, in March, hotels in Brussels have opened their doors to offer a total of 820 rooms to host the homeless people. Meanwhile, those infrastructures have closed and as off today, only 92 rooms are available (according to Bruss’help).

To “Infirmiers de rue” it is a big regret.