key: cord-0734766-7hf9wood
authors: Kryger, Meir H.
title: Pandemic
date: 2020-09-03
journal: Sleep Health
DOI: 10.1016/j.sleh.2020.08.003
sha: fc92c44b1c7b53f595882b02497677a821036d22
doc_id: 734766
cord_uid: 7hf9wood

nan

A work of art can take us back in time and teach us. Taken in context, the painting Sleep, depicting a scene in Taos, New Mexico, is jarring in its beauty and sadness. At first glance, we are struck by the wonderful colors, patterns, and symbols (eg, corn, the plant most sacred to the Navajo people).

"One's eyes are drawn to the arc of faces starting on the woman wearing the multicolored shawl, to the woman wearing a black shawl to the child sleeping. To the eye of a doctor and any viewer, the child is in danger. The face is in distress; the cheeks are flushed. This Native American child likely had tuberculosis or influenza. Native Americans didn't have the natural immunity to fight these diseases brought by white settlers." 1 The creator of this work, Walter Ufer (1876-1936) was an immigrant to the United States. He was born in Germany, and when he was a child, his family immigrated to Kentucky. He trained to be an artist and fell in love with the images and people of Taos, New Mexico, and moved there in 1914. Just 4 years later, the Spanish Flu epidemic that killed perhaps 50 million people worldwide decimated the population of Taos. During that pandemic, Ufer helped the one doctor caring for the entire population living in Taos.

Besides lacking the immunity to face the virus, Navajos had traditions that may have worsened the situation. 2 The rooms of the sick were filled with smoke by medicine men. When people died of influenza, Navajos burned the dwellings of the deceased; survivors who might have been infected moved into the dwelling of others. It was estimated that about 5% of the entire Navajo Nation perished during the Spanish Influenza Pandemic.

One hundred years later, as the world confronts the COVID-19 pandemic, Native American communities are especially hard hit. On May 11, 2020 "The Navajo Nation, the country's largest Indian reservation, now has a higher death rate than any U.S. state except New York, New Jersey, Connecticut and Massachusetts." 3 Medical science has known for over a century how to combat pandemics. This is from the front page a newspaper in New Mexico in 1919. 4 

Their Harrowing Experience: A Social History of the Spanish Influenza Among the People of New Mexico

Tribal nations face most severe crisis in decades as the coronavirus closes casinos

The ten commandments for the control of influenza. Las Cruces Sun-News