By Vijay S. Limaye, Jaime Madrigano, Kim Knowlton, Shubhayu Saha, Chihuu Nguyen, & John Balbus

Climate change adaptation has historically been defined narrowly, emphasizing actions such as built environment and early warning system improvements. The integration of social protection policies into climate change adaptation policies has the potential to reduce climate-health risks, but no prior study has investigated social protection policies within an adaptation context. Our study examined how climate-health burdens have affected US states and the extent to which social protection policies have positioned states to adapt to climate change. We assessed and ranked states by climate-health burdens (2005–24), as well as the maturity of twenty-one social protection policies (2019–25) across five domains. Our analysis also included a qualitative policy review (2019–25) of climate risks and social protection policy implementation in ten states. Results showed a mismatch between regions with the greatest climate-health burdens and those with the most mature social protection policies, with higher burdens accumulated in southern and southeastern states and more mature policies clustered on the western and northeastern coasts. None of the ten states in our policy reviews had developed a comprehensive approach to social protection to reduce the climate-health burden. These findings suggest that climate adaptation frameworks should be broadened to include social protection policies, which strengthen climate resilience across sectors.

Source Healthaffairs