UMBC logo

Maryland Institute for Policy Analysis and Research (MIPAR)

MIPAR receives HUD grant to study asthma interventions in Baltimore

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development has awarded a three-year, $750,000 grant to MIPAR, the Green and Healthy Homes Initiative™ (GHHI), and The Hilltop Institute at UMBC to conduct a cost benefit analysis of the reduction in asthma and associated Medicaid expenditures resulting from the implementation of GHHI’s interventions. GHHI is a national program spearheaded by the Coalition to End Childhood Lead Poisoning. The aim of GHHI is to integrate health-based housing interventions with weatherization to create access to healthy homes for children in low income neighborhoods.

The UMBC study will focus on GHHI interventions in the homes of low-income families with asthma-diagnosed children in Baltimore City. The project will evaluate the extent to which GHHI interventions impact asthma morbidity and health care utilization costs, school absences, utility costs and work-loss days for parents or caregivers of children with asthma. The study will also examine how different levels of GHHI interventions impact post-intervention resident health and overall non-medical and energy cost savings.

The interdisciplinary research team includes Principal Investigator David Salkever of the UMBC Department of Public Policy/MIPAR, Co-Investigator Michael Abrams of The Hilltop Institute at UMBC, researchers from the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, and Co-Principal Investigator Ruth Ann Norton, Executive Director of the Coalition to End Childhood Lead Poisoning/GHHI.