Pandemic Complicates Tribes' Quest For Data Sovereignty

Imagine if your state health department put out a press release specifically naming your family, and listing the number of your family members with COVID-19.

That, says Ken Lucero, is exactly how it felt in April when New Mexico announced a coronavirus hotspot in his community, the Pueblo of Zia.

“We kind of felt like someone was airing our dirty laundry, or just coming in and invading our privacy at a very private moment,” said Lucero, who is a tribal administrator with the pueblo. He also has a PhD in social justice and previously ran the Center for Native American Health Policy at the University of New Mexico.

Lucero and his colleagues had been posting updated COVID numbers on the pueblo’s Facebook page. But then they started noticing those numbers appear elsewhere, like in news articles, and then, most alarmingly, statewide press releases.

Read more: https://www.wyomingpublicmedia.org/post/pandemic-complicates-tribes-quest-data-sovereignty