Opinion: How the Inflation Reduction Act can help decarbonize the health care industry

The climate crisis — the greatest threat to human health in history — is often framed “in ways that pay little attention to its health dimensions,” as the authors of The Lancet’s annual “Countdown: Tracking Progress on Health and Climate Change” report were forced to remind us.

This tragic reality was on display in Health Affairs, JAMA, Kaiser Health News, and The Lancet itself, among others, when they limited their reporting on the recently passed Inflation Reduction Act to its enhanced Affordable Care Act subsidies and drug cost reforms. They failed to highlight for the health care industry that the IRA’s tax credit provisions for renewable energy, formerly called energy security, are for the first time refundable for tax-exempt entities. This means that the largest greenhouse gas polluters in the health care industry — the vast majority of hospitals that are nonprofit or tax exempt — can take advantage of these economic subsidies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

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