By Chloe Hsi, China
Image: Prosperity Now
The Indigenous people of the United States have faced centuries of oppression and marginalization by their own government. During the COVID-19 pandemic, minority groups especially the indigenous have been hit hard by lack of resources, infection, and higher mortality rate than any other ethnicity. Historically, pandemics seem to be particularly hard on the Indigenous, like during the Spanish Flu. Alaska Natives contributed to 80% of the mortality during the 1918 Spanish Flu.
Indigenous people are more likely to suffer from the more harmful effects of COVID-19, considering their lack of resources and funding, medical discrimination and suboptimal healthcare, and high rates of diabetes and heart disease. The COVID-19 pandemic has shone a light on the health inequalities, intergenerational trauma, and structural racism that the Indigenous people are still facing today. The Navajo Nation, the second-largest tribe in North America has 13 grocery stores and only 12 medical facilities across more than 27000 square miles of land. One in three inhabitants also does not have access to electricity and running water. Casinos and tribal businesses have also been forced to close, which is depriving the community of much-needed income. Internet coverage is also very patchy, making it hard to access important information on COVID-19. The IHS (Indian Health Service) has a budget of $6 billion for the healthcare of 2-5 million people. The amount funded provides way fewer resources than Medicare, Medicaid, and the Veterans Health Administration on a per capita basis. The IHS has received additional money to withstand COVID-19, however, the money will not make up for the years’ worth of serious underfunding.
The Navajo Nation does not have a tertiary intensive care unit, meaning people residing in the community cannot easily access intensive care if needed. Patients who need high-level services will have to fly out to university hospitals. Getting diagnosed at the beginning of the pandemic was also especially hard, as they did not have the resources or facilities to administer COVID-19 tests and quarantine.
However, the Navajo Nation and other communities have achieved great success in vaccination coverage, as governments created easily accessible drive-through clinics across reservation communities, making vaccination more obtainable throughout the community. The success of vaccinations in Indigenous communities would not have been as great without the Indigenous approaches to leadership. By the Elders and revered individuals receiving the vaccine first has influenced many Indigenous peoples to get the vaccine.
Distrust in the medical system and government will continue to exist even as the country recovers from the COVID-19 pandemic. If Indigenous communities continue to be marginalized by the government and continue to be severely underfunded, if such tragic epidemics were to occur again, it could cause tremendous impacts on Indigenous societies. Indigenous societies are more vulnerable to dealing with the impacts of socio-economic changes like COVID-19 thus, governments must advocate for equal treatment of communities especially in the medical industry. They must also continue to be funded adequately so that all individuals living in Indigenous reserves have access to clean water, electricity, and tertiary healthcare.
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