The Alamo Community Suffers A Loss

This Covid is terrible:

Now, the residents of the Alamo Navajo community in central New Mexico have been left to grieve the coronavirus-related deaths of Pino and two other members of her immediate family in isolation as they continue precautions aimed at slowing spread of the illness.

Marie Pino, 67, taught elementary school for decades and, interested in a new challenge, had started teaching middle school science last year. She died May 13, weeks after burying one of her three sons, Marcus Pino, 42, who coached the school’s basketball team and was determined to engage teen boys in the sport he loved growing up. He died April 16.

Marie’s husband, Ira Pino Sr., 65, was an emergency medical coordinator who went on to pastor a church during the last decade of his life. He died May 31.

“They’ve left a hole in our school community,” said Barbara Gordon, a school counselor and athletic director at the 300-student tribal school. “We haven’t been able to see each other since this all happened.”

Their deaths, three of the five coronavirus fatalities in the remote outpost of the Navajo reservation, are an example of how the pandemic has devastated many Native communities.

The Navajo Nation, which spreads across several states, has a higher per capita infection rate than any single state, its health department has reported. That may be because of factors like higher rates of poverty, lack of access to running water in some areas, and the rural nature of some communities. Alamo families may travel several hours to see a doctor.