Nation returning to ‘Orange Status’ Monday as COVID-19 spreads again

DÁ’DEESTŁ’IN HÓTSAA

The Navajo Department of Health on Friday reported 67 new COVID-19 cases and one new death.

This comes after having 49 new cases and two deaths reported on Wednesday.

The last time the case update was large was on Jan. 6, 2021, right around the peak of the winter wave, with a total of 298 cases. The latest counts are 31,821 cases and 1,387 deaths as of Aug. 13.

NDOH on Monday issued a health advisory notice for 19 communities because of the uncontrolled spread of the coronavirus.

Navajo Nation officials said the tribe would return to “Orange Status” starting Monday because of the recent rise of coronavirus cases.

Council Delegate Daniel E. Tso, the chair of the Health, Education, and Human Services Committee, said COVID-19 cases are skyrocketing across the country amid the Delta variant of the coronavirus. This means that the Delta variant is in the Navajo Nation.

“We can’t deny that we should not look at those numbers,” Tso said in an interview with the Navajo Times on Friday afternoon. “We have to really be careful.

“The Nation is enduring many losses, and of those that have tested positive, some are enduring complications. The trauma from the pandemic, it’s with us, and it’s affecting (the Navajo Nation), and we can’t look away.”

Tso said the increasing numbers show that people do have to wear a mask.

“If we don’t have access to water and soap, we have to use hand sanitizers,” Tso said. “Those practices got us to real low numbers. We really have to be cautious.”

Public health orders

The NDOH on Thursday issued three new public health emergency orders – No. 2021-017, No. 2021-018, and No. 2021-019 – for businesses and schools while revising in-person gathering limits for specific events.

The 50% maximum occupancy level remains for restaurants, including indoor dining, drive-thru, curbside, and outdoor dining. Other businesses include Navajo casinos, lodging, and hotels, including campgrounds, RV parks, museums, and zoos. Marinas and tribal parks, as well as tour businesses, must follow the Health Command Operations Center’s “Reopening Guidelines for Tour Businesses.”

Personal care and services are allowed by appointment with cleaning between appointments. Flea markets and roadside markets are permitted following the guidelines issued by the Health Command Operations Center.

“While the ‘Orange Status’ remains at 50% of maximum occupancy for most businesses, we encourage customers to wear their masks and for employers to support employees’ time off from work to get vaccinated,” Jill Jim, the executive director of the Navajo Department of Health, told the Times on Friday afternoon.

President Jonathan Nez said businesses in the Navajo Nation are doing an excellent job enforcing COVID-19 safety protocols from the NDOH.

“I believe that’s why we are not seeing cluster cases develop from businesses,” Nez told the Times.

“Clusters are mostly related to gatherings among households,” Jim added. “Please reduce gatherings and hold off until it’s safe.”

Schools must implement all the required core prevention strategies and conditional prevention strategies noted in the “Safe Schools Framework” issued by the Department of Diné Education.

NDOH recommends schools, especially communities with high transmission rates, implement more aggressive social distancing measures, hybrid learning, and implement 15 or fewer persons for non-classroom instruction events such as back-to-school, orientations, and other community gatherings.

Virtual learning is encouraged for those 12 years and younger. Students, staff, and visitors are encouraged to stay home if they are sick and report any exposure to the virus using the HCOC portal online (https://www.ndoh.navajo-nsn.gov/COVID-19) and notify the nearest health facility.

“The provisions under ‘Orange Status’ focus on limiting the number of people at in-person gatherings and urging school boards to take more action to offer hybrid and virtual learning options for parents and students,” Nez said.

“We know there’s a lot of concerns from parents, and we encourage them to be proactive in voicing their concerns to school boards and school officials.”

The final public health order, No. 2021-019, limits in-person gatherings to 15 people for social meetings, traditional ceremonies, churches and other houses of worship, outdoor recreational activities, and youth programs.

However, 25 or fewer people are permitted to meet for in-person meetings, and training and drive-in gatherings are limited to 50 vehicles or less.

The tribe’s mask mandate remains in effect, and there is no daily curfew or lockdown.

“Other cases are also due to off-Nation travel where people go to hot zones and don’t wear masks,” Nez said. “The message from the health experts across the country urges eligible people to get fully vaccinated as soon as possible and to wear masks when (close to) others, especially those who live in other households.”

COVID-19 surge

Northern Arizona hospital officials say the highly transmissible Delta variant is fueling the current surge.

“Unfortunately, COVID-19 infections have not gone away as we had hoped,” said Dr. John Mougin, the physician executive of quality and safety, at Northern Arizona Healthcare in Dook’o’oosłííd-Kinłání. “We’re seeing a spike in cases with some highly infectious variants.

“The Delta variant is making up most of our cases now. Early data suggests that Delta variant of the virus is 200-250% more transmissible and may lead to much higher––up to 1,000 times, higher viral loads than previous COVID-19 viruses.”

Mougin said this means that a single person with Delta variant infection could infect as many as six to 10 others.

“This is compared to two or three others estimated with the original strain of COVID-19,” Mougin told the Times. “So, this compares to chickenpox as far as the contagiousness of the Delta variant.”

Mougin said those who are unvaccinated and infected with the Delta variant have an 85% higher risk of requiring hospitalization than those who have received an entire course of COVID-19 vaccination.

But as the Delta variant gathers speed, so are the COVID-19 vaccine mandates across the country.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported on Thursday that about 196.5 million people had received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, including about 167.4 million people who have been fully vaccinated by Johnson & Johnson’s single-dose vaccine or the two-dose made by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna.

In Arizona, 66% of people have received at least one shot, while 56.3% are fully vaccinated, according to the CDC’s Aug. 12 vaccination rate report.

In the Navajo Nation, 121,312 people are fully vaccinated by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna, as of Aug. 6, according to NDOH.

Dr. Derek Feuquay, the chief medical officer at NAH, said Northern Arizona Healthcare still sees COVID patients from the nearby Native communities, including the Navajo Nation.

“(The Native communities) did a fantastic job of getting vaccinated,” Feuquay said. “They got hit so hard in April, May of 2020. And those communities really got their heads around the importance of vaccination. The health care system out (in those communities) did a wonderful job of getting people vaccinated.”

Feuquay added that while NAH is still seeing COVID patients from Native communities, the patient number is not nearly in the numbers percentage-wise NAH saw early in the pandemic.

---