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Environmental remediation
The Navajo Nation Council banned uranium mining under the Diné Natural Resources Protection Act of 2005, but much of the mining contamination remains. While the Environmental Protection Agency says that $1.7 billion has been secured through legal settlements with mining companies and other agreements dating back to at least 2014 for cleanup at 219 of the 523 abandoned uranium mines on the Navajo Nation, the Diné say little of the work has been completed. “The biggest thing is that out of the $1.7 billion dollars I think the total amount that has been spent as of today is $116 million on studies. … Out of the 219 that were funded, not one site is 100 percent ready to be cleaned up,” Navajo Council speaker Seth Damon said last year, according to the Navajo Times. The newspaper reported that the Environmental Protection Agency hopes to begin cleaning up the sites by 2024.
Indigenous organizations are doing a tremendous amount of work to address radiation poisoning and water scarcity in the Diné community. These include the Red Water Pond Road Community Association where activists like Terry Keyanna are fighting for environmental justice every day. The Navajo Water Project, a section of the larger non-profit DigDeep, is doing valuable work to address the lack of access to clean water in the Diné community. Since last March, Gavin Noyes and Woody Lee at Utah Diné Bikeyah have provided food and supplies to more than 800 homes, and delivered “175,000 gallons of new water storage capacity to over 600 families without water.” The Navajo and Hopi Families COVID-19 Relief Fund is another grassroots organization, started with a GoFundMe page created by former Navajo Nation Attorney General Ethel Branch that raises money for two weeks’ worth of food for Diné and Hopi families in self-quarantine. Their work is a pivotal lifeline in pandemic times.
In the early days of President Joe Biden’s term, he issued an executive order to establish the COVID-19 Health Equity Task Force to ensure an equitable pandemic response and recovery. His administration has officially recognized “systemic and structural racism in many facets of our society” as a driving factor behind the disproportionate impact of COVID-19 on communities of color. We have reason to hope that help is at hand. Systemic racism, language barriers, mistrust of federal agencies, misinformation about uranium mining, preexisting medical conditions from chronic radiation illnesses, and an acute water scarcity make the Diné uniquely vulnerable to the pandemic. The double public health crises in the Navajo Nation need our urgent attention and immediate assistance.
Acknowledgement: The authors thank Zia Mian and Robert Alvarez for comments on an earlier draft of the essay. A UROP Award from Boston University in fall 2020 facilitated this research.
https://thebulletin.org/2021/02/radiation-illnesses-and-covid-19-in-the-navajo-nation/?fbclid=IwAR0wN6WZZ2_eAqGo0IRNXkkfmDXwhEBSoN9wh3EluN7qNZTn5-iyAM8y22M
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