In 2003, a group of community advocates came together and worked with Utah legislators to create a program within the Utah Department of Health that will focus on health-related issues within Utah’s multicultural populations with special emphasis on racial and ethnic minorities. That is how, during the 2004 legislative session, the Center for Multicultural Health was created by statute.

In the 2011 legislative session the Center for Multicultural Health was renamed Office of Health Disparities Reduction (OHD). The new office had a broader mission than the former Center for Multicultural Health, which focused only on racial and ethnic minority health. The OHD continued its commitment to reducing racial and ethnic health disparities, but also looked for opportunities to address health disparities by geography and income.

With the merger between the Utah Department of Health and the Utah Department of Human Services (DHHS), and thus the creation of the Utah Department of Health and Human Services, the Office of Health Disparities was renamed as Office of Health Equity (OHE). This name better reflects our mission of not just reducing health disparities but also advancing health equity in the State of Utah. The merger was effective July 1, 2022.