There are many parallels between climate change and medical topics. Some can be useful in educating people and politicians. It is frustratingly difficult to get people and their governments motivated to act to avert climate change. Yet people are intensely interested in threats to their own health. Many Americans have improved their health by making major changes that are directly attributable to the results of medical science. Real progress has been made in making Americans, and their government, more aware of unhealthy behavior. Medical science has achieved a measure of pervasive respect that climate science can only envy. Journalists covering a medical discovery do not mistrust researchers or insist on hearing from “the opposing view.” When reporting on research showing the need for Americans to eat more sensibly and be physically active, the media does not treat these advances in medical science in terms of a dispute. Journalists do not feel obliged to seek out medical contrarians “for balance.” Medical metaphors and parallels between the two fields (such as “prevention is better than cure”) can thus be powerful aids to communicating.