Hear a Zoom kitchen-table interview with Kay Medicinebull and her parents Larry and Rose Medicinebull (and their two-year-old granddaughter) as they discuss their experience with COVID-19 on the Northern Cheyenne reservation and share prayers, songs, stories, memories and hopes.
The family is joined remotely by Kay’s friend Health Education Specialist and Epidemiologist Lauren White. After our interview Lauren sent information showing that:
- The CDC reported that between January 1, 2020, and July 3, 2020, laboratory-confirmed cases of COVID-19 among Native Americans and Alaska Natives appeared to be 3.5 times that of non-Hispanic whites nationwide.
- Of the four counties in Montana with the highest rates of people experiencing underlying conditions know to increase the danger of COVID-19, three (Glacier, Roosevelt and Big Horn) are majority Native American.
- Big Horn and Rosebud counties, the two counties in which the Northern Cheyenne reservation is located, have the highest known rates of COVID-19 per capita of all Montana counties as of October 3, 2020.
- Abigail Echo-Hawk calls the lack of data on COVID-19 among Native Americans “a national disgrace.”