Thousands of senior citizens are dying homeless in Los Angeles, records reveal

Death reports obtained by the Guardian show elderly people are regularly dying on the streets of LA: They're incredibly alone'

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.

More than 1,700 of the unhoused people age 60 and over who died probably lived unsheltered. They were found in alleys, tents, encampments, bus stops, parks, yards, parking lots, cars, RVs and sidewalks and other locations suggesting they may have been living outside.

About 1,500 deaths of the deaths were ruled natural", attributed to causes like heart failure, liver disease and Covid; 1,355 deaths were labeled accidental", including drug overdoses and traffic collisions; 74 were homicides; and 44 were suicides.

Elderly people far past the age of retirement died on the streets and in homeless shelters: A total of 221 people age 75 and older have died while unhoused since 2014, including dozens of people in their 80s and two 92-year-olds.

Black Angelenos were disproportionately represented in the death toll, making up 33% of older people who died while unhoused, while only 9% of the broader county population is Black.