Three Years of COVID-19

COVID-19 remains a public health threat in Cibola County. It is not, however, effecting people the way it did when the disease first broke loose and ran wild across the world. This is, in part, thanks to the engineering marvels of American scientists who quickly developed a vaccine and managed to get enough people vaccinated that the disease could not kill Americans so easily, along with a weakening of the disease’s fatal ability to improve its transmissibility.

As of March 13, 213 Cibola residents have died of the disease. Not every single COVID death is properly attributed, and given the very high spread of COVID-19 through the community, it is very likely that the true death toll in Cibola is undercounted.

Experts say that mask wearing and social distancing remain the best and most effective way to cut the spread of disease. With holiday celebrations starting to wind down, history shows that Cibola should prepare for a spike in COVId-19 cases.

Currently, Cibola County has 283 active cases of COVID-19. This is a massive departure from the beginning of 2023 where 373 active cases, a difference of 90 active cases from the start of the year.

Since the disease hit the county, there have been massive changes. Before COVID-19, Continental Divide Electric Cooperative and SacredWinds Communications were working on increasing Cibola’s broadband capabilities, an important asset as the world was about to change in an internetheavy fashion.

Public Health Emergency On March 11, 2020 New Mexico saw its first cases of COVID-19. The four cases were all believed to be travel related involving one couple that traveled to Egypt and two others that had traveled to New York. Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham ordered a state of emergency for New Mexico.

On March 12, the state announced that mass gatherings of 100 or more people were to be halted until spread of the disease could be halted.

On March 13, Grants-Cibola County Schools followed suit with the rest of the state and suspended in-person learning for three weeks. Overjoyed students were excited to have a three-week break, little did anyone know that break would soon extend over a year of cancelled inperson classes.

On March 14, the New Mexico Department of Health began to implement drive-up COVID-19 testing centers where residents could check to see if they are infected. Over the next several days businesses were ordered to limit their capacity or close altogether.

On March 24, Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham held a press conference in an empty House of Representatives chamber at the NM Capitol building, the Roundhouse. Here, the governor issued a Stay-at-Home order and effectively closed the state.

The pandemic would continue to ravage New Mexico and the rest of the country. Through political turmoil and anger, Cibola survived the disease. Today, both the federal and state government are looking to end the public health emergency over COVID-19, which will make data reporting more difficult.

2020

COVID-19 started in 2020. Officially, the disease was declared a pandemic on March 11, 2020.

Just 13 days after the pandemic was declared, Cibola County had its very first case of COVID-19 on March 24. This was the first officially recorded cases of COVID-19, but it’s unlikely that was the first COVID case in the county because the first officially recorded death from COVID came only days later, on April 1.

COVID-19 cases would only continue to grow, New Mexico would join the rest of the country and the world by shutting down. Cibola County ended up in a messy political fight between the Grants Mayor and the New Mexico Governor about closing down private businesses.

The end of November would see the single largest spike to that point in COVID19 infractions. There were two days in November, the 19th and 23rd, where Cibola recorded over 90 new COVID infections. This was a massive undercount from the true toll of the disease.

2020 ended after leaving at least 63 residents of Cibola dead. As if the year wasn’t bad enough, November introduced the Delta Variant of COVID, which was far more transmissible. This led to an explosion in COVID cases at the end of the month that fed into December.

2021

Delta was not quite as deadly as the original form of COVID-19, but it was far more transmissible. While Delta took the rest of the country by storm, much like it did to Cibola in late 2020, it also infected so many people that natural immunity began to set in. Unfortunately, natural immunity did not last long and many people were reinfected.

2021 would see a little change through the year with the COVID situation, but many states would remain closed down and many people would stay in their homes to avoid getting sick.

It wasn’t until the end of September when a variant worse than Delta, called Omicron, would begin to surface that COVID would begin to spike again in Cibola.

T he end of September began a steep and deadly climb in COVID-19 infections.

There were a number of data issues with the numbers that came from the State of New Mexico. This made it very difficult to properly track deaths and infections as the state would add deaths and infections and then remove them the next day with no warning whatsoever. Data issues continue to plague New Mexico’s understand of the true COVID-19 toll.

2022

This was a much better year for Cibola’s fight against COVID-19. Cases remained relatively stable, only spiking in the summer and only slightly after holidays like Halloween.

For the most part, cases remained stable in 2022. New Mexico rarely reports cases and then removes them without warning, though it does still happen.

To see how far COVID increased this year, dive into the numbers: People aged 0-9 started the year with only 446 cases; this group ended the year with 1011 cases. This is an increase of 565 infections.

Residents aged 10-19 started the year with 633 cases; this group ended the year with 1389 cases. This is an increase of 756 cases.

Those Cibolans aged 2029 began the year with 737 cases; this group ended the year with 1,389 cases. This is an increase of 631 cases.

Cibolans aged 30-39 started the year with 713 cases; this group ended the year with 1,369 cases. This is an increase of 656 cases.

Residents aged 40-49 began the year with 603 cases; this group ended the year with 1,251 cases. This is an increase of 648 cases.

People aged 50-59 started the year with 571 cases; this group ended the year with 1090 cases. This is an increase of 519 cases.

Residents aged 60-69 started the year with 411 cases; this group ended the year with 846 cases. This is an increase of 435 cases.

People aged 70-79 started the year 220 cases, this group ended the year with 471 cases. This is an increase of 251 cases.

Residents 80-89 started with 126 cases; this group ended the year with 227 cases. This is an increase of 101 cases.

Residents 90+ began the year with 33 cases; this group ended the year with 54 cases. This is an increase of 21 cases.

The deadliest month in 2022 was January, where at least 12 Cibola residents died of COVID-19. Overall, in the year, at least 47 Cibola residents have died to the virus.

2023

With two and a half months passed so far this year, Cibola is sitting in a pretty position compared to the rest of the county’s time with this disease.

The year began with 373 active cases of COVID-19. That number has whittled down. At the beginning of February, Cibola had 280 active cases of COVID. As March began, Cibola had 300 active cases, which has dropped to 283 cases as of March 12.

If the public health emergency is declared over, the Cibola Citizen will have a difficult time tracking the data at the same pace and accuracy as we currently do. The newspaper is seeking information from the community to see if this information is still relevant to the community. Please let the paper know if this is data readers would like to see by emailing us your thoughts at editor@cibolacitizen.com.