How one aid agency delivers medical care, showers, haircuts – and dignity – to homeless people in Belgrade.
Gray hangs over the Serbian capital, swallowing the outlines of buildings and bridges in the morning mist. Yet, here and there, a ray of sunshine pierces through the thick veil of clouds, struggling to illuminate the city’s hidden corners. The only thing breaking the silence is the persistent hum of a generator under Branko’s Bridge, echoing off the cold asphalt. It powers a truck-turned-clinic, around which a group of people gather, mostly familiar faces, with one or two newcomers.
My colleague and I are also here this morning. We park nearby and walk toward the group, hoping not to disrupt the ritual of people from the streets of the capital – a gathering of homeless people on a concrete platform by the road leading under the busy bridge, toward the Sava River, with a view of neglected undergrowth, searching for something to at least briefly ease their cares.
“We come almost every Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday,” says a man with tired eyes and a gray beard, rolling a cigarette. His name is Dragan, originally from the town of Senta, and he has been walking the streets of Belgrade for 20 years.
Dragan is a musician. The melodies he plays on his guitar on the streets of central Belgrade awaken hope even on the gloomiest days. “I am a lone wolf,” he says, “but sometimes I enjoy company. I choose it carefully because I don’t like to hang out with those who drink too much and use drugs. I immediately give them a stamp that says ‘good to avoid.’ ” He laughs, his eyes shining as he watches the people gathered around. “Here we are all more or less the same, looking for a little peace and humanity. About 70 of us gather, sometimes more, sometimes less. We know that ADRA comes with Drumodom on those days, our home on wheels for a few hours.”
He points to a white truck and van parked on the concrete. “They bring us clean clothes, medicine, they examine us. And they take our dirty clothes to wash.”
Dragan pauses for a moment, his gaze wandering somewhere in the sky above Branko’s Bridge. “Oh, if only they came more often … And if that blue bus would return. You know, they have that one, too, with showers and toilets inside. A real bathroom on wheels! But it broke down a month ago – it’s an old bus.” His voice is lost in the noise of the generator powering the mobile medical clinic.
What is Drumodom?
The Drumodom service normally includes four vehicles, explains Milica Jocic, an associate with the Adventist Development and Relief Agency (ADRA), while overseeing the morning rush under the bridge. “We have a bus with showers, a truck for medical examinations, a van for transporting equipment, clothes, and everything that is needed.”
Inside the white truck is a mobile doctor’s office. The interior is clean and tidy, with basic medical equipment and medicines, a table, a chair, cabinets with drawers, a scale, and a blood pressure monitor. The atmosphere is calm and professional; the doctor and medical technician patiently listen to each patient and provide them with the necessary care.
In addition to examinations and treatments, medicines, vitamins, and supplements are also distributed here, and if necessary, the doctor will refer a patient to a specialist. For many homeless people, this is the only place where they can receive adequate medical care.
The blue bus Dragan hopes to see again soon is equipped with two showers, a mirror, sink, and hairdryer. The water is warm, and soap, shampoo, and towels are also available. In a separate part of the bus, there is also a barber’s chair where volunteers cut hair and shave clients.
The bus known as the “bathroom on wheels” was awaiting repairs. “It’s an old bus – parts are hard to find,” says Igor Mitrovic, the country director at ADRA Serbia, in between greeting everyone who came here that day. (Back in service now, the bus once again offers clients warm relief on cold winter days.)
Although the Drumodom team provides assistance throughout Belgrade, this place under the bridge has become a kind of station, a known gathering point for those who need help the most.
“We are here from Monday to Thursday, from 9:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. In winter, working conditions are difficult due to the cold; sometimes we have to adapt working hours to weather conditions,” Jocic says.
“The advantage of this kind of field work is that we come directly to people, where they live and stay,” she continues. “Homeless people are often excluded from society, and we help them bridge that gap and exercise their rights. We ask them what they need and adapt the services to their needs. They told us they needed a place to wash clothes, shower, and [get] medicine, and we provided that.”
Drumodom is much more than just a mobile service. It is a comprehensive support program for those who find themselves on the street. Aside from basic services, what makes it special is the human approach: medical assistance, social support, and even help with obtaining personal documents.
“Drumodom means a lot to me,” says Dacho, who has been on the street for almost a decade. “It’s not about things, you see, I have everything I need,” he says, pointing to a full backpack. A small man, Dacho spends most of his time in central Belgrade.
Smiling, Dacho boasts of his skills at matchmaking and reciting poetry, showing off a new T-shirt with the image of Nikola Tesla, a gift from a passerby. “Today is a really good day for me!”
But Dacho often needs more serious medical help. His medical history is full of diagnoses. With a glimmer of hope in his eye, he says he will soon check into a psychiatric hospital in the town of Kovin. “To ‘recover’ from alcoholism, but also from all other diseases,” he says.
He pauses for a moment, then adds: “I wouldn’t have made it without ADRA.”
“Dacho actually did everything himself, and we were there as an aid and motivation, which is the essence of our task,” Jocic says.
The faces of these people are marked by life on the edge, and their eyes wander somewhere in the distance, as if searching for answers in the gray horizon of a difficult everyday life. However, this November morning is a little different for them. There is a faint smell of coffee on the cold, humid air from the river.
“We asked Milica what would make you happy,” I say, as we pour hot, homemade coffee from a thermos and watch people gather around the Drumodom truck with full cups in their hands.
“She said that you like coffee with a lot of sugar, especially on cold mornings like this.” Jocic nods in confirmation, a smile spreading across her face. “Coffee refreshes them, makes them a little happy, and gives them the strength to survive another day a little easier,” she interjects.
“It is very important to provide assistance in the field,” continues Jocic. “Existing shelters and social work centers are not always available or adapted to the needs of the homeless. We go where they are – to the streets of Belgrade. This way, we provide them not only with basic services but also with the feeling that they are not forgotten and rejected.”
This job is not simple. Every day brings new challenges, from logistical problems to fighting prejudices and systemic limitations.
“Field work is not easy,” Jocic admits. “Weather conditions, whether winter or summer, present a challenge. But we are used to it.”
Then she says, “However, it is not easy because the number of our users is growing, the needs are growing, and resources are limited.”
A Shoestring Budget
Financial challenges are perhaps the biggest. Maintaining four vehicles, procuring medicines, providing medical and social assistance – the cost soon mounts. Drumodom relies on donations and grants, mostly from international donors, but that is not always enough.
“All this costs money,” says Mitrovic, watching the line of people in front of the medical truck. “Treatments are prescribed by specialists, and in most cases, we cover the costs. Many of our clients do not have health insurance or cannot pay doctor’s fees.”
“We spend about 200,000 dinars [1,700 euros] a month on medicines and referrals alone,” he adds. “And that amount could grow. Unfortunately, we do not have unlimited funds. We cover urgent needs, but that is unsustainable in the long run.”
“All the doctors, medical technicians, and volunteers are extremely pleasant,” says Dragan, a man who has been through a lot in life, including a three-year prison sentence. “I can’t single anyone out, nor can I blame anyone for anything.”
He needs a lot of different medications, he adds. “Social assistance of 11,674 dinars does not cover all expenses, so it means a lot to me that I can get medical help and medicines here, not just a shower.”
Drumodom was initially financed by sister ADRAs from all over the world and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, with the support of the Slovak and U.S. governments, and, later, the European Union and the Austrian government.
Concerned members of the public also help out.
“Although donations from the public are not large in absolute terms, they mean a lot to us,” Mitrovic says. “We would like to invest more in raising funds from people, but also from companies.”
In addition to donations, Drumodom also received limited funds from the city of Belgrade on two occasions. “Those are the first and only [Serbian] public funds we have received,” he points out.
How (In)visible are the Homeless in Serbia?
Jocic tells us that the number of homeless people is constantly increasing. “Every month we have new people, an average of seven or eight a month, new families who need help. There are also technical problems with the vehicles, breakdowns. All of this creates additional challenges. However, systemic limitations are the biggest obstacles,” she says.
“We often face complicated procedures when we try to help people exercise their rights – to obtain personal documents, a health card, or accommodation. I wish those doors were more open, that these people could be urgently accommodated without major difficulties and conditions,” she says.
“Unpleasant or awkward situations with clients are rare. Sometimes we have emergencies in the field when we have to react quickly and call an ambulance. But that’s part of our job,” she adds.
In the first nine months of 2024, Drumodom provided medical services to 1,228 people, Mitrovic says. Around three-quarters of its clients are men.
Often, a person makes repeat visits for medical care, bringing the total number of medical consultations to about 700 a month.
Drumodom served more people last year, around 3,100.
“This year there will be a little less, but not because there are fewer of them, but because we had to make the difficult decision to focus on a smaller number of people in serious condition and support them for a longer period of time due to the smaller scope of our resources,” Mitrovic explains.
This data only scratches the surface of the problem of homelessness in Serbia.
“The situation is worse than it seems at first glance,” says Marko Vasiljevic of the A 11 Initiative for Economic and Social Rights, a human rights advocacy group. “Official data significantly underestimate the extent of homelessness, and decision-makers often downplay the problem.”
On this November morning, the question arises: how many more are hidden in the shadows of the city, far from the eyes of the public and statistics?
“The methodology for counting homeless people has not changed, even though organizations have appealed for it,” Vasiljevic continues, noting that counts are made indirectly by different social support agencies, leading to wide discrepancies between official data and figures gathered by organizations that work directly with the homeless.
These groups estimate that more than 4,000 people in Belgrade alone are affected by primary homelessness – they sleep rough or in improvised shelters. But, “according to official data, there are slightly more than 1,500 in the whole of Serbia,” he says. “Without reliable data, you cannot create appropriate policies and measures, nor can you plan the resources you need to solve [homelessness].”
How It All Began
Mitrovic leans against the van, his eyes following the people patiently waiting their turn in front of the Drumodom truck.
“It all started in 2018 with my colleague Marko Tomasevic from the non-governmental organization Klikaktiv. We were watching videos together of a bus in San Francisco that delivers assistance to the homeless and thought how great it would be if we had something similar. Just at that moment, ADRA announced a competition for innovative projects, and we applied with that idea. We received funds, and in 2020 we started implementing it. We’ve had our bus since then,” he tells us.
Unfortunately, lack of funding and budget cuts forced the service in San Francisco that inspired them to close last year. However, this example showed them how important this type of support is and gave them the motivation to persevere in their mission.
“It wasn’t easy,” Mitrovic admits. “It took time to procure and adapt the bus. But when we became visible, we couldn’t give up. The need was clear, and support came from almost all sides.”
From the start, there was a clear need for a mobile unit with showers. Parking it was the problem. The initial idea was to provide services at several locations in the city, but Drumodom was unable to find adequate parking space in the wider center.
“This location under Branko’s Bridge is not ideal,” he continues. “It’s located on a busy road, but we somehow managed to fit in. … We tried to find space in the yards of companies, public institutions, but no one was interested.”
The Drumodom fleet used to also serve clients at a parking lot below the Kalemegdan fortress. “Kalemegdan was great until the trams started, then we had to move for safety reasons,” he says.
One of the problems Drumodom faces is the inability to connect to the electricity grid. “We have been trying to solve this problem for five years, but without success. The city of Belgrade, unfortunately, is not able to offer us an efficient solution. Because of this, we are forced to use a generator, which creates a lot of noise and inconvenience for both us and the users of our services,” Mitrovic explains.
“The problem is that society has prejudices against homeless people,” he says. “They are considered dangerous and undesirable. But that’s not true. These are people who need help and understanding.”
Looking to the Long Term
Even though reliable data is lacking to assess the needs for similar services elsewhere, civil society organizations recognize Drumodom’s effectiveness in the capital.
“Drumodom should serve as a role model when creating other social protection services for vulnerable social groups at the local level,” Vasiljevic of A11 says. “A possible limitation concerns the capacity and ability to respond to the needs of all clients, which is why it is important that these services are established at the institutional level.”
“This program can be applied in other environments as well, because as a model it certainly already exists in other countries, but it is important to adapt it to the specifics of each local community,” Mitrovic comments.
He is not aware of a similar service elsewhere in the region. “The Western Balkans are specific in how the problem of homelessness arose – the disintegration of the country [Yugoslavia], transition, poverty. That’s why many solutions from Western countries cannot be directly applied to us. We have to find our own way, respecting our specificities and resources.”
Public bodies in Serbia frequently ignore requests for information from journalists, and they have become even less responsive amid the outcry over the deaths of 15 people when a railway station canopy collapsed in the city of Novi Sad. In response to an inquiry about funding to tackle homelessness and cooperation among state authorities and relevant civil society groups, the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs said that it has no data on the number of homeless people in Serbia, as care for the homeless falls under the jurisdiction of local governments.
The ministry did say that it earmarks funding to assist “underdeveloped local governments in order to establish and ensure the availability and sustainability of social protection services,” including shelters and reception centers, without providing details.
ADRA’s Jocic says the organization cooperates closely with the public authorities. What’s more, she argues that the state should be more involved in such work, saying, “Drumodom represents a model of intersectoral cooperation that the system should take over, because homelessness is not only a matter of a roof over one’s head, but also of many other issues: health, mental health, social protection.”
In Vasiljevic’s view, there is an urgent need to revise national policies for social protection, poverty reduction, and housing. He notes that the last strategic plan for social protection services expired in 2009, the poverty reduction strategy in 2010, and the social housing strategy in 2016.
Reflecting on the critical issue of providing decent housing for homeless people, he notes that a new national housing policy – envisaged in legislation on housing adopted several years ago – has yet to be drafted. At the same time, the law on social protection “does not even recognize homeless people as a particularly vulnerable category, although the housing law mentions them as potential beneficiaries of housing support programs.”
In addition, what housing programs do exist often disadvantage the homeless in relation to other socially vulnerable groups, he says.
This difficult institutional framework, along with insufficient understanding of the problem of homelessness, makes it difficult to implement innovative solutions. A growing number of housing experts in Serbia think the Housing First model could be applied here.
“This approach, unlike traditional models, starts from the premise that housing is a fundamental human right and a key prerequisite for overcoming homelessness,” Mitrovic says.
The Housing First approach changes established practice. Instead of expecting homeless people to first solve all their problems in order to get a roof over their heads, they are provided with permanent housing and support in finding a job, medical or addiction treatment, and inclusion in the community. This model has proven to be more efficient and cheaper than traditional models, but in Serbia, unfortunately, it is still being implemented slowly. [Ed. note: For a look at a Housing First pilot program in the Czech Republic, see here.]
While there’s growing recognition of Housing First, it’s mostly being implemented in larger cities like Belgrade and Novi Sad through international charities such as the Red Cross and Caritas. Drumodom also hopes to begin cooperating with NGOs in Novi Sad, the capital of the autonomous Vojvodina region. Smaller towns and rural areas, however, often lack the resources and infrastructure for such programs. In one notable exception, a recent EU-funded project in the city of Cacak provided housing and support services for 12 economically vulnerable families. Although progress is slow, these initiatives offer hope that Housing First can become a more widespread solution to homelessness in Serbia.
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Vladimira Dorcova Valtnerova is a media consultant and journalist based in Serbia’s Vojvodina province. She is the owner and editor-in-chief of Storyteller.rs, a bilingual Serbian and Slovak news outlet specializing in solutions journalism and narrative journalism.
