New Mexico lucky to have Lujan Grisham as our leader

MY DAUGHTER Sarah and her husband, Adam, called from upstate New York recently to tell me I had to watch Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham’s April 30 coronavirus briefing. I watched it, and it’s not brief; it’s a serious hourlong presentation with slides and presentations by the secretaries of Health and Human Services, followed by a second hour of questions from and responses to radio, TV, and print media reporters.

(They) were particularly impressed by the discussion of COVID-19 on nursing home patients in New Mexico . ... After Adam’s mother died at a nursing home ... a few years ago, they formed a family council of patients, families and providers that meets weekly to discuss conditions in and concerns about the facility. They know personally about the fragility of nursing home patients and the burdens on their families. New York’s governor, Andrew Cuomo, is doing great work with nursing homes they told me. But what your governor knows and what she is doing is just amazing.

New Mexico has a governor who is a former Cabinet Secretary of Aging and Long Term Care and former Secretary of Health. She knows the facts and the science. She listens to the experts in her administration. She listens to reporters and urges all New Mexicans to contact her administration with questions. And she talks about our “most vulnerable” nursing home residents as “our brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers, grandmothers and grandfathers, who are beloved members of our community who deserve our attention and support.”

We are so lucky in New Mexico to have Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham as our leader and partner right now.

TASIA YOUNG Albuquerque