How bad were the outbreaks?
Native Americans and Alaska Natives
have been hit harder by the pandemic
than any other community in the U.S.
They are 3.5 times more likely to be
infected with Covid-19 than whites, and
are 1.8 times more likely to die from
the disease, according to the Centers
for Disease Control. Nationwide, 1 in
every 475 Native Americans has died
from the coronavirus, compared with
1 in 645 African-Americans, another
hard-hit group. In Mississippi, 1 in
every 127 indigenous people has died
of Covid-19; in the Navajo Nation—a
sprawling reservation that straddles Arizona, New Mexico, and
Utah and is home to 175,000 people—more than 1,150 have
died, a rate of about 1 in 160. Last May, the reservation registered
the highest infection rate in the U.S. The pandemic has worsened
severe substance-abuse issues and poverty on reservations, in part
because of the shuttering of Native-run casinos. “Everyone has
been impacted,” said Amber Kanazbah Crotty, a Navajo tribal
council delegate. “Some families have been decimated.”Why such a heavy toll?
It’s partly because Native communities are so poor, and have had
such limited access to health care. In some remote areas, there
is one hospital for an area the size of Delaware, and the Indian
Health Service, a federal program that serves 2.6 million people,
is underfunded and understaffed. A third of Native Americans
live in poverty, and the population disproportionately suffers
from chronic health conditions—including obesity, diabetes, liver
disease, hypertension, and respiratory disease—that heighten
the risk of dying from Covid. Even before the pandemic, Native
Americans had an average life expectancy 5.5 years lower than the
national average. “We’re more at risk [of Covid] because we are
Native people living in the U.S., where we have been experienc-
ing this kind of oppression for the past 500 years,” said Abigail
Echo-Hawk, chief research officer at the
Seattle Indian Health Board and a mem-
ber of the Pawnee Nation. Many Natives
live in crowded, multigenerational house-
holds, exacerbating spread to vulnerable
old people. As of mid-January, 565 of
the Navajo Nation’s 869 deaths were
among people age 60 and older. The loss
of so many elders has been uniquely dev-
astating to Native communities.Why is that?
Elders are revered in Native communi-
ties, and serve as repositories of history
and culture. They pass down Native
languages, oral histories, songs, prayers,
medical knowledge, and cultural tradi-
tions. “It’s like we’re having a cultural
book burning,” said Jason Salsman, a
spokesman for Oklahoma’s Muscogee
Nation. “We’re losing a historical
record.” In the Navajo Nation, many
hataalii—practitioners of traditionalmedicine—have died. Among the
Cherokee, who in 2019 initiated
a program to preserve their dying
language, dozens of the remaining
speakers have been lost to Covid
over the past year. “Our language,
culture, and traditions is what makes
us Cheyenne,” said Desi Rodriguez-
Lonebear, a Cheyenne and an assis-
tant professor of American Indian
studies at the University of California.
“But we’re losing our teachers.”What is being done?
In some areas, tribal leaders have
instituted safety measures beyond state and local mandates. In the
Navajo Nation they’ve banned large gatherings, organized pro-
masking campaigns, and enforced curfews and stay-at-home orders,
putting up checkpoints and threatening violators with fines and
jail terms. Some tribes, such as the Eastern Band of Cherokee in
North Carolina and Oglala Sioux in South Dakota, have at times
barred nonresidents from reservations. On the federal level, $8 bil-
lion was allocated to Native American communities as part of the
first coronavirus relief package last March—though many Natives
complained that a months-long delay in allocating the money cost
lives. In early February, President Biden signed a major disaster dec-
laration for the Navajo Nation that cleared the way for additional
federal funding for vaccine distribution and medical staffing.Are Native Americans getting vaccinated?
Yes. In fact, Native communities are well ahead of the general pop-
ulation when it comes to inoculating their members. Over half of
Navajo Nation residents have received at least one shot, for exam-
ple, while the Rosebud Sioux of South Dakota have been inocu-
lated at double the state rate. With the virus rampaging through the
reservations, tribes have created aggressive outreach programs to
get vaccines to remote populations. A strong sense of community—
and fear of extinction—has increased compliance rates. In a
recent survey, 75 percent of Native
Americans said they’d be willing to
get the vaccine—20 percentage points
above the general population. The
main motivation, the study reported,
“was a strong sense of responsibility
to protect the Native community and
preserve cultural ways.” The high
Navajo vaccination rates are “enough
to give our people real hope,” said
Navajo Nation President Jonathan
Nez. “We got through smallpox, we
got through tuberculosis, and we will
get through this.” Still, tribal leaders
express concern about damage to their
communities that will be felt long
after the pandemic passes. “I fear the
long-term impacts on mental health,
our children, community resilience
and cohesiveness,” said Rodriguez-
Lonebear. “We’re in the middle
of a massive storm, and we’re not
prepared for the aftermath.”Briefing NEWS 11
A funeral for a Standing Rock Sioux elder who died of CovidCovid’s assault on Native Americans
Ge
tty
New hope for neglected tribes
After decades of federal neglect, tribal leaders
are cautiously optimistic about securing more
money and attention from the Biden admin-
istration. On the campaign trail Biden—who
notched key wins in Arizona and Nevada with
help from Native voters—issued a detailed
agenda of policies intended to aid Native
Americans, ranging from reinstating the White
House Tribal Nations Conference to investing in
Native agriculture. He has nominated a Native
American, Deb Haaland, to head the Department
of the Interior, which plays a significant role in
Native American affairs. Tribal leaders say they
hope to see a series of other actions from the
Biden administration to improve infrastructure,
stem environmental damage, and fully fund
the long-criticized Indian Health Service. “We’re
helping other nations with billions in aid,” said
Navajo Nation President Nez. “We should be
working on improving quality of life for the first
citizens of this country, who are being ignored.”The coronavirus has taken a devastating toll on indigenous communities across the U.S.