Foodways to Health: Transforming a health system’s food is medicine program to address climate change and community health resilience

Food Is Medicine (FIM) programs promote patients’ access to healthy foods to help prevent, manage, and treat diet-related health conditions. Although these programs have burgeoned in recent years, they have remained siloed in health care and represent a missed opportunity to fight climate change and promote community health resilience. Addressing these aspects of community health and well-being requires new strategies and interventions for FIM programs. In this article, the authors describe the University of California, Davis Health’s Foodways to Health approach as a regional food system, which increases access to fresh produce and medically tailored meals while promoting climate-friendly food production practices and community engagement. They highlight five key pillars of the approach, share a framework to evaluate climate-friendly FIM programs, and underscore lessons learned for health systems embarking on FIM programs to improve healthy eating, climate protection, and community resilience.