SARASOTA - A new study shows that foreclosure not only hurts your credit, it harms your health.

The report for the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) shows that within a zip code, as foreclosures go up, so do rates of diabetes and high blood pressure in otherwise healthy people.  That coincides with what the newly released Community Health Improvement Partnership (CHIP) survey found in Sarasota County.

“These stresses that are caused by a poor economy really impact individuals,” said Kari Ellingstad, director of CHIP.  Its survey conducted last year did not ask specifically about real estate but its numbers show that the economic downturn took its toll on people's health.  “About 22% of our survey respondents reported that financial stress has caused them some health problems,” said Ellingstad.

It also showed what she called a “marked increase” in the number of people without health insurance – from 16% reported in the 2006 survey to 23% in the one conducted in 2010. One in six people cut back on preventive care, Ellingstad said, and one-quarter refused to see a doctor even when they needed to.

While financial hardships can contribute to health problems, the stress of going through a foreclosure can also cause illness.

“When you don't know where you're going to be living, whether it's the next few weeks, few months, or even a year,” said Richard Reich, Ph.D., an assistant professor of psychology at USF Sarasota-Manatee, “it can be very stressful.”

Besides the uncertainty, said Reich, there is also the guilt.

“There's the moral stress of not being able to pay something that they agreed to pay,” he said.

If people are ill-equipped to get treatment, that can make the broader economy sicker, which creates a public health issue.

“The diseases and conditions that arise because of a lack of preventive care only exacerbate a tough economic situation,” Ellingstad said, “at the individual level and at the community level as well.”

Read the entire CHIP report at http://www.chip4health.org/research/.