Health inequalities and government indifference are hitting communities hard.

It was in 1832 that the U.S. government first began delivering health care to Indigenous communities. Congress allocated $12,000 to vaccinate those living in nations near white frontier settlements against smallpox.

Justin Ling
August 6, 2020

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Photo: Miss Navajo Nation Shaandiin P. Parrish grabs a box filled with food and other supplies to distribute to Navajo families in Counselor on the Navajo Nation Reservation, New Mexico, on May 27.
Credit: Sharon Chischilly / Getty Images

Statistical gaps can make it difficult to properly allocate public resources to Native Americans. When that’s the case, one leader said, “tribal nations have an effective death sentence.”

Kate Conger, Robert Gebeloff and Richard A. Oppel Jr.
July 30, 2020

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Photo: Tashina Nunez, a nurse and a Yakama Nation descendant, said it appeared that many of the coronavirus patients at her hospital in Washington State were Native Americans.
Credit: Mason Trinca for The New York Times

Vibrant Hawaii

Vibrant Hawaiʻi hosts Abigail Echo Hawk, Executive Director of the Urban Indian Health Institute and Liz La quen naay Medicine Crow of the First Alaskans Institute to talk story about decolonizing data, data justice, and data governance.

NIHB

The National Indian Health Board (NIHB) hosted a webinar on contact tracing in Indian Country. Case investigation and contact tracing are core methods used by Tribal, local, and state health departments for disease control and is a key strategy in preventing the spread of COVID-19. Contact tracing is used to identify and alert people of potential contact with a person infected with the novel coronavirus, which causes COVID-19. This webinar explores how contact tracing is being carried out in Indian Country.

In a remote patch of desert near the Salton Sea, the Torres Martinez Desert Cahuilla Indians run a small health clinic from a triple-wide trailer on their reservation.

Outside the clinic doors, a white tent has been set up to provide coronavirus testing, now often in 100-degree heat…

Amanda Ulrich
July 17, 2020

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Photo: Medical assistant Luis Jimenez works at the Torres Martinez Indian Health Clinic in Thermal, September 16, 2019.
Credit: Jay Calderon/The Desert Sun