American Indians are Showing Us How It's Done


In an earlier post, I noted that American Indian communities, particularly those on reservations, have been getting hammered by the pandemic. I suggested that this may be one reason why Arizona's numbers have looked so bad compared to other mountain west states like Colorado.

Here is a graph from the ASU Biodesign dashboard comparing new cases per 100K people, 7-day moving average, for Navajo and Apache counties (green and blue lines, respectively, with large reservation populations) with Maricopa county (maroon line, holding 60% of the state's population):

At most time points the Apache and Navajo have higher rates than Maricopa, sometimes by a lot.  

For fatalities the situation is even worse. The Guardian recently ran a story on how the pandemic is decimating American Indian and Alaskan Native communities. They have an interactive chart showing that, in Arizona, American Indians die at more than twice the rate per 100K people as do the next highest groups (whites, and Latinos).  

That tracks the national numbers: "Nationwide one in every 475 Native Americans has died from Covid since the start of the pandemic, compared with one in every 825 white Americans and one in every 645 Black Americans." On the Navajo Nation, the situation is even worse, with one in every 160 people dying of the disease, according to the article.

But There is Good News

Though the reservations have taken a beating from the virus, they seem poised for a very effective vaccination campaign. To begin with, they seem to have fewer COVIDiots. A recent survey reported that 75% want to be vaccinated (compared to to around 50% of Americans overall who want a shot). Importantly, these folks say they want to get vaccinated the help protect their community, even though they have concerns about safety and side effects.

The tribes are also killing it when it comes to getting shots into arms. A CNN report notes that they have done this through effective public health communication, emphasizing community protection. They have also put native language speakers and tribal leaders at the front of the line for shots to help build trust. As a result, in many cases they are outpacing county and state programs. 

That seems to be the case here in Arizona. Using data from the newly-added Vaccine Administration section of the ADHS Dashboard (and population data from here), I calculated the number of people per 100K population receiving at least one dose of the vaccine:
Apache county is doing just about as well as Maricopa, but Navajo is doing over 40% better.  Here's hoping that performance will continue and that our friends on the reservations will get some relief from their suffering.
 

Image by Corona-zona using images by  ALBERTO H. FABREGAS and Arek Socha from Pixabay 

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