The Lancet Planetary Health, February 2025

Editorial

Disappearing climate science

It was clear during the US presidential election campaign that if re-elected Donald Trump would be no friend to the environment. The assault on climate science and action began immediately. At the time of writing, a spate of executive orders and political appointments are disrupting and dismantling progress across the climate and environmental science community.

Federal agencies, like the US Department of Agriculture, have taken down web pages that reference climate change and paused farm payments for wildlife conservation and climate change adaptation. This move will leave farmers more vulnerable to climate change. The removal of information from the US Forest Service website could hinder preparedness for future wildfires in the wake of the devastating California wildfires, which were exacerbated by climate change.

The new head of the Environmental Protection Agency, Lee Zeldin, has downplayed the urgency of action on climate change and insisted that US research and policies on climate, fossil fuels, and transport should remove so-called left-wing zealotry and focus on providing cheap energy for American households and achieving American energy dominance. This outlook ignores the fact that the impacts of climate change are projected to cost a great deal more—in monetary and health terms—than adaptation and mitigation measures, and that the worst-off in American society are the most vulnerable to environmental change. Who within society shoulders the cost of energy transitions is a matter of policy, and a just transition that provides health and economic benefits, especially for those most pressed by the cost of living crisis, is possible.