New Haven, CT — Newly released data from the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication shows that a majority of U.S. voters want federal agencies to increase their efforts to protect people from the health harms of climate change. Meanwhile, the U.S. government is trying to enact sweeping cuts to FEMA, the EPA, the NIH, and Medicaid as the country enters its most dangerous season for climate disasters.
Candice Fortin, U.S. Campaign Manager, 350.org, responds:
“Climate disasters don’t just destroy homes, lives, and livelihoods in their initial devastating sweep, they also wreak havoc on our health over time. Frontline Black, brown, and Indigenous communities have been sounding the alarm about this for decades and have consistently been left critically under-resourced. This new data confirms that the majority of U.S. voters know this and support increased government protection from the health impacts of climate change. Yet instead of ramping up efforts to protect our health against climate impacts, the administration is doing the exact opposite of what the majority of voters want and need.
“Whether it’s cutting FEMA’s emergency training ahead of hurricane season or cutting people’s access to medical care, the U.S. government is sentencing a growing population to mass disability, malnutrition, houselessness, and premature death, whether it happens in the immediate wake of an acute climate disaster or slowly and painfully over years. The U.S. government is trying to use magical math and misinformation about public opinion to justify gutting social services, but the data confirms what we already know: people feel the health impacts of climate change and want the government to protect them from it.”