CONNECTION BETWEEN DECADES LONG WATER ISSUES AND SPREAD OF A PANDEMIC: A NAVAJO NATION CASE STUDY

Often compared in size to the state of West Virginia, the Navajo Nation has an area of over 27,000 square miles. Situated in the southwestern Colorado Plateau, the Navajo Nation’s geography and topography are characterized by arid deserts, alpine forests with high plateaus, mesas, and mountains reaching up to 10,388 feet in altitude. One of the biggest present-day problems faced by the Navajo people is access to clean and safe water resources. Many residents of the Navajo Nation suffer from limited access to good quality water; of the more than two million Americans who do not have running water, Navajo households are 19 times more likely than white households to live without running water. This low availability is due in part to a gap in infrastructure, but, as is true throughout the arid Southwest, the problem is compounded by poor water quality, including high salinity, microbial contaminants, and metal contaminants. The emergence of the novel coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2 resulted in a global pandemic claiming loss of lives, disrupting health care, education, and economy of nations around the world. COVID-19 is the disease caused by SARS-CoV-2. In summer 2020 the Navajo Nation registered highest per capita COVID-19 infection rate in the US. The main reason for this is the high occurrences of diabetes, respiratory diseases (RDs), and cardiovascular diseases (CVD) in the Navajo people, which are the major comorbidities in COVID-19 cases. There is a long and rich history of coal and metal mining in Navajo Nation, and there are many abandoned uranium mine sites proximal to Navajo communities causing high indoor radon concentrations. Reports have linked metals and radon exposure to diabetes, RDs, and CVD. There are several pathways of human exposure to toxic metals, including direct contamination of soil, drainage of contaminated mine water, and air pollution from coal-fired energy plants. Moreover, nearly one-third of the Navajo residents do not have access to public water supply and often get exposed to water from unregulated wells and springs, mostly with elevated metal levels. This study demonstrated the reasons behind the poor water quality in the Navajo Nation, its impact on adverse health implications of Navajo communities, and how it has contributed to the rapid spread of the COVID-19 pandemic across the Navajo Nation.