Navajo Nation

Over the last two months, in addition to buying groceries, paying bills, and keeping lights on for hundreds of families reeling from the devastation of this pandemic, Together Rising has made sure your money is prioritized for those who are often the last in line.

 

Today we are sharing about your investment in the Navajo Nation’s defense of their people. 

 

The Navajo Nation has more coronavirus cases per capita than any state in the US -- with 1,786 cases per 100,000 people. 

 

Chronic underfunding, in violation of treaty obligations, has resulted in widespread structural, economic, and health injustices fueling the spread of the pandemic among these first citizens.

 

Up to 40% do not have running water; 30% do not have electricity; and 16% live in overcrowded conditions. These injustices, coupled with high rates of lung disease due to decades of exposure to uranium mines, mean high coronavirus vulnerability and death. 

 

Appallingly, the Navajo Nation and other indigenous peoples did not receive federal coronavirus relief until last week -- six weeks after it was due, and only after a lawsuit on eligibility. 

 

In spite of these injustices, the Navajo Nation is stepping up in extraordinary ways, including activating their Commission on Emergency Management to direct their own defense. 

 

In collaboration with and under the leadership of Navajo Nation leaders, you have funded $105,262 for masks, eye protection, gloves, PPE, ventilators, oxygen concentrators, and other medical equipment to the Navajo Nation.

 

This life-saving equipment – supplied through our long-time collaborators at Direct Relief – is part of the largest medical donation to the Navajo Nation in recent history.

 

Together Rising has chosen to invest your dollars to this effort because it is self-determined by the Navajo people. You are funding only those supplies that Navajo Nation leaders specifically request as necessary to the protection of their people, and these supplies are being distributed by that leadership based on their own assessment of urgencies. 

 

Thank you for trusting us to invest your money wisely.