It's not easy to make public health decisions without access to good data. And epidemiologists and public health workers for Native American communities say they're often in the dark because state and federal agencies restrict their access to the latest numbers.
KFF Health NewsAug 6 2024 It's not easy to make public health decisions without access to good data. And epidemiologists and public health workers for Native American communities say they're often in the dark because state and federal agencies restrict their access to the latest numbers.
"We're being blinded," said Meghan Curry O'Connell, the chief public health officer for the Great Plains Tribal Leaders' Health Board and a citizen of the Cherokee Nation. The sharing of data has improved somewhat in recent years, she said, but not enough. Shewbrooks, director of the center's data-coordinating unit and its lead epidemiologist, estimates staffers spent more than a year's worth of their time during the pandemic scraping together their own datasets to steer information to tribal leaders making decisions about closing down reservations and asking residents to isolate at home.
Shewbrooks said state contact tracers relied on calling and texting patients, which is often not the most effective method. Tribal members can be a hard-to-reach community for state workers whose protocol is to move on to the next case if they don't get a response.In 2022, the Government Accountability Office published a report that confirmed concerns raised by tribal health officials, including at the Great Plains tribal epidemiology center.
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