18. Indians—still invisible; Equality—not yet

The Navajo Nation now has its own line on the worldometers coronavirus site: https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/us/. I’ve been following it, and trying to get information on other tribes, because I know from Indian friends that there is generational memory of pandemics. Although the coverage is poor, there is occasionally a story. The news isn’t good.

Yesterday I stumbled on a UCLA American Indian Studies Center site. The information was dated—June 5 the latest numbers—but profound. In a bar graph with Indian reservations and American states lined up by cases of coronavirus per 100,000, five reservations, including the Navajo, are in front of New York and New Jersey.

On June 5, when New York showed 1,800 cases per 100,000, the White Mountain Apache were at 6,000 +; Pueblos of Zia and San Felipe at 3,000 +, and the Navajo Nation just slightly more than New York State. But, you say, the Apache reservation is so small, only 15,500 members. Yes, and on that June date, 1009 cases and 11 deaths. Think La Grande—or halve the numbers for Wallowa County: 505 cases; 5 deaths.

I can’t find stats for today—Indians are still largely invisible. Maybe because they are scattered on over 500 reservations and in urban pockets across the land; maybe because there just aren’t as many Indians as there are Blacks and Latinx. Maybe because many Americans don’t think of Indians at all; they are a part of our past, not our present.

But today, the Navajo Nation, with its 174,000 members and 369 Covid-19 deaths, lands on the worldometers national graph. And today New York shows 2155 per 100,000; the Navajo Nation over 4000! Today New York’s 32,000 deaths compute to 165 per 100,000; the Navajos are at 212.

The Covid-19 toll among all Americans is becoming grimmer by the day, and the toll among Blacks, Latinx, and American Indians reminds us that there is a road to travel in realizing the equality clauses in our founding documents.

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