New York, February 5 (RHC)-- A new study shows the population of homeless students in the United States has reached the highest level in over a decade.  More than one and a half million public school students said they were homeless during the 2017-18 school year, according to the report from the National Center for Homeless Education.

Most of the 1.5 million homeless schoolchildren stayed with other families or friends. But 7 percent lived in abandoned buildings or cars.  The data shows an increase of over 100 percent in the number of homeless reported over a dozen years ago.

“The ripple effect here is real,” Dr. Megan Sandel, a director of the Grow Clinic at the Boston Medical Center, told the New York Times.  Sandel said housing instability was associated with developmental delays in children and children in fair or poor health.

Students living in unsheltered places also saw an increase of nearly 140 percent.  The study found that the crisis was often caused by fluctuating economic conditions, unaffordable housing, and drug addiction.  Despite the rising numbers, experts suggest that many families still refrain from reporting homelessness.

Meanwhile, homelessness for common public is also growing in large American cities mainly as a result of rising rent prices, despite a drop in the number of people living on streets across most of the United States.

Many cities on the U.S. West Coast are struggling with acute homelessness amid an unprecedented level of poverty and hardship in the region, a new report suggeest.

The incidence of homelessness is growing faster in the least affordable rental housing markets and cities with skyrocketing home prices, including New York City, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Washington, DC, according to the study by Zillow, an online real estate database company.