Thousands of senior citizens died in Los Angeles while homeless in the past 10 years, with residents age 60 and over representing a quarter of all deaths of unhoused people in that period, according to a Guardian analysis of public records.
A common misconception about California’s homelessness crisis is that the majority of people on the streets are young adults who came from out-of-state, drawn to warm weather and homeless services. But death reports obtained by the Guardian reveal more than 3,000 of the 11,500 people who died while unhoused in Los Angeles county between 2014 and 2023 were 60 and older, highlighting the vulnerability of older residents in one of the US’s most expensive regions.
