Federal office focused on climate change and health has zero funding

A week after taking office, President Biden signed a sweeping executive order that established a new federal office focused on addressing the health consequences of climate change, which disproportionately affects poor communities and communities of color.

The administration had grand plans for the office. For the first time, it would marshal the full powers of the federal government to help Americans sweltering under deadly heat waves, breathing in dangerous wildfire smoke, fleeing from massive flooding and struggling to access clean drinking water amid a historic drought parching the West.

“Many climate and health calamities are colliding all at once,” Biden said at the time, adding, “Just like we need a unified national response to covid-19, we desperately need a unified national response to the climate crisis.”

But nearly a year after the Department of Health and Human Services launched the Office of Climate Change and Health Equity, Congress has not provided any funding, forcing it to operate without any full-time staff at a time of worsening climate disasters across the country, according to interviews with four officials there.