State of Indian Nations address touches on problems of disrespect for tribal sovereignty and of missing and murdered Indigenous women, as well as new challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic.
COVID-19 by the numbers New Mexico health officials yesterday reported 315 new COVID-19 cases, bringing the statewide total so far to 177,867; the health department has designated 112,051 of those cases as recovered. Bernalillo County had 120 cases, followed by Doña Ana County with 41 and Sandoval County with 22. Santa Fe County had nine cases. The state also announced 13 additional deaths, including a woman in her 90s from Santa Fe County. There have now been 124 deaths in Santa Fe County and 3,412 statewide. As of yesterday, 396 people were hospitalized with COVID-19. The health department yesterday also announced it will be adjusting the way it reports county-level vaccination figures on its vaccination dashboard, after discovering the reports were pulling data based on where vaccinations were taking place versus New Mexicans county of residence. As of today, the dashboard will display vaccination totals based on county of residence. New Mexico s vaccination program is
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New Mexico PBS correspondent Antonia Gonzales talks with Navajo Nation First Lady Phefelia Nez about her work in New Mexico and Arizona on the issue of Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women. Nez serves on the New Mexico task force that just announced suggestions for dealing with this problem. First Lady Nez also discusses upcoming efforts to educate and provide resources to tribal members.
PHEFELIA NEZ: I have been working with the task force and for the Navajo Nation, from the Office of the First Lady and Second Lady. A lot of our efforts have been revolving around just educating the public on MMIW and then as well as human trafficking, because there is a connection there definitely, but it’s not one and the same. And then we’ve been reaching out to Arizona’s Governor’s Human Trafficking and Advisory Council and then New Mexico Human Trafficking Task Force. So, it s been a lot of efforts of partnering with them to educate the public on some of these items.