The Healthy Pest Free Housing Initiative (HPFHI) is an innovative community project to reduce environmental health risks and asthma in Boston public housing communities. The project seeks to improve asthma and the overall health of public housing residents by eliminating infestation, reducing pesticide use and exposure, and maximizing resident peer education. The project builds on the Healthy Public Housing Initiative, which has documented that nearly 50% of the Boston Housing Authority homes showed cockroach allergen levels in excess of asthma sensitivity exposures, and over 60% of the children showed allergic sensitivity to cockroach antigens. Project activities include hiring and training housing residents to be employed as health advocates; developing a multilingual, multimedia public health information campaign to be delivered to housing residents; distributing Healthy Home Kits which include information and supplies for pest management and for reducing asthma triggers in the home; and developing a pesticide “buy back” program, to eliminate potentially toxic substances from the environment. The peer education component is multilingual and culturally sensitive. Prior to HPFHI, two pilot programs were implemented and evaluated and shown to be effective in two Boston public housing communities. The HPFHI is an extension of these pilot programs and is currently being implemented in 15 Boston public housing sites.

The Healthy Pest Free Housing Initiative aims to reduce environmental health risks and asthma among residents of Boston public housing through education, outreach, and systems change.

The HPFHI is currently being evaluated across all locations (2006-2009). The pilot projects, which occurred in two separate housing communities and which served as the springboard for the HPFHI, were both thoroughly evaluated and shown to be effective. In these pilot studies, all of the units that received the pest intervention had “light” or “no” pest activity by the end of the study, while 100% of the units that did not participate had no improvement in pest infestation. In the second housing community, results showed that by the end of the program, units with “light” or “no” pest activity increased from 77% to 100% and the common areas with “light” or “no” pest activity improved from 0% pre-intervention to 100% post-intervention.