Native tribes embracing the COVID vaccine

CHEROKEE, N.C. — Joyce Dugan did not hesitate before sitting down inside the Cherokee Indian Hospital for her second and final dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. “I’m proud of our hospital,” the 72-year-old former tribal chief said as a nurse quietly prepped her arm. “I’m proud that we’re able to get these shots.”

Though mistrust of the vaccine has been a problem in minority communities across the U.S., the opposite is true for the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians, a Native American tribe of 16,000 in western North Carolina, and other tribes across the country, which were also quick to adopt coronavirus prevention measures.

The federal Indian Health Service said Tuesday that it has administered nearly 385,300 doses of COVID-19 vaccines. At a rate of about 18,490 per 100,000, that’s higher than all but five U.S. states, according to an Associated Press analysis of federal data.

The trend is owed both to a harsh reality — Native Americans and Alaskan Natives are four times more likely than white people to be hospitalized from COVID-19, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — and tradition. Community before self has long been a core principle in Native American culture.

“We already innately have held on to that cultural tradition of taking care of our community,” said Abigail Echo-Hawk, director of the Urban Indian Health Institute in Seattle and a citizen of the 3,000-member Pawnee Nation. “The rest of the United States could learn from us.”

In March, Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians Principal Chief Richard Sneed made the controversial decision to close access to Qualla Boundary, the Cherokee name for the tribe’s reservation in North Carolina. Only tribal citizens and essential workers were allowed through police barricades, cutting off tourism and shutting the tribe’s casinos, its main source of revenue.

“The data we were looking at told us that if we did nothing, we could expect that by April we would have about 400 positives,” Sneed said.

Feeling the financial strain, the reservation opened again after seven weeks — and, as expected, case counts rose steadily. The tribe has lost 10 people to the virus since March, but the majority of the 1,299 members who contracted COVID-19 have recovered.

The Navajo Nation, which occupies the country’s largest Native American reservation with about 175,000 residents in Arizona, New Mexico and Utah, declared a public health emergency in March even before its first positive case was confirmed. A flurry of public health directives followed, including a mask mandate, shelter-in-place orders, daily curfews and weekend lockdowns. Tribal leaders banned mass gatherings and ordered the closure of schools, four casinos and other tribal businesses, along with tribal parks popular with tourists.

The measures have taken an enormous financial toll. The casino enterprise laid off more than 1,100 workers in January after exhausting federal virus relief funding. It said it might be forced to close permanently if it cannot secure additional funding or partly reopen.

The Navajo Nation recently lifted weekend lockdowns so that residents could be vaccinated. So far, the Indian Health Service has administered more than 90,000 doses in the Navajo region. With support from the federal government, the tribe hopes to hit 100,000 by the end of this week.

“Everyone is knocking down the door trying to get a vaccine,” said the Navajo Nation’s health director, Dr. Jill Jim.

In North Carolina, a major reason why members of the Cherokee tribe have not hesitated to get the vaccine is their hospital. Some Native American tribes rely on healthcare facilities owned and managed by the Indian Health Service, but the Eastern Band took control of its health system in 2002.

Written on the wall inside the lobby of the hospital, built in 2015, is one of the Eastern Band’s guiding principles: “Ni-hi tsa-tse-li.” In Cherokee, it translates to, “It belongs to you.”

The move helped mend a once-fractured relationship between providers and patients. The strong bonds between them have paved the way for acceptance of the COVID-19 vaccine.

“Many of our healthcare providers have been here for 10, 20 years,” said Dr. Rick Bunio, the tribe’s clinical director. “The community trusts them.”