How New Mexico Flattened the Coronavirus Curve – The New York Times

LAS CRUCES, N.M. On March 13, the same day that a reluctant President Trump admitted that the coronavirus pandemic was a national emergency, a storied New Mexico hospital established the nations first drive-through testing for the virus.

The next day, hundreds of cars lined the streets of Albuquerque, the states largest city. A second hospital jumped in with more testing. Within days, drive-through testing still not widely available in much of the nation, even today expanded here to Las Cruces, to the southern edge of the state.

One of the nations poorest states, with a small population flung across 122,000 square miles, New Mexico quickly accomplished what for the United States as a whole seems elusive: widespread testing for the deadliest pandemic in a century.

For all its haunting, natural beauty, New Mexico is a land of grit. Led by Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, the state swiftly shuttered much of its economy, not waiting on the federal government. It also tapped two secret weapons: sophisticated medical knowledge, a legacy from its role as a hub of aerospace research, and the scientific power of the nuclear weapons laboratories that occupy the states high desert plateaus.

On its face, New Mexicos success might seem hard to believe. For years, young people fled the state in search of better economic opportunities elsewhere. The opiate crisis hit hard and early. Despite a rich history and an equally rich culture, New Mexico just couldnt keep pace with its wealthier neighbors, Texas, Colorado and Arizona.

Two recent developments made a difference, though. Though the oil and gas boom has gone bust, while it lasted it helped fill the states coffers, providing something of a fiscal cushion. The second is Governor Lujan Grisham. Before serving as governor (and before that, a U.S. representative), she had been the states health secretary.

As the states top health official, she dealt with the sort of problems that make the coronavirus so calamitous: underserved rural populations, urban pueblos and rural reservations dependent on government help, rampant poverty and poor public health. During her stint, she focused on suicide prevention, building new laboratories and facilities and tackling infectious diseases.

When Covid-19 attacked, Ms. Lujan Grisham sprang into action. She declared a statewide health emergency on March 11, when just four people in her state had tested positive and two days before the president.

In the background, the state was already moving. One of the states most valuable assets is Lovelace Health Systems, one of the states three biggest hospital networks. Modeled on the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota, Lovelace became famous for administering the physicals that narrowed the field of the original Mercury astronauts. Veteran physicians had already endured the 1993 outbreak of Hantavirus, a deadly, aerosolized respiratory virus spread by deer mice. Lovelace drilled extensively for the Ebola outbreak in 2014.

By February, executives at Lovelace and the states two other largest systems Presbyterian Healthcare Services and the University of New Mexico were trading notes. Troy Greer, the chief executive of Lovelace, recalled asking, How could we work together to give the state its best shot?

By early March, as Mr. Trump downplayed the crisis, Lovelaces top doctor and engineer sketched out exactly how they would provide drive-through testing on a pair of napkins. On March 11, Ms. Lujan Grishams administration said it would provide the test kits, from a stash of supplies in a state lab, if the hospitals provided the labor. Two days later, Lovelace opened for business in one of its parking lots, testing 200 people on the first day and then 800 the next day. The next day, Presbyterian took the baton. Soon the testing spread across the state.

Meanwhile, the governor was doing battle with the president. During a March 16 teleconference between the president and governors and Mr. Trump, he told them to get their own ventilators. Try getting it yourselves, he said. An angry Governor Lujan Grisham shot back, If one state doesnt get the resources and materials they need, the entire nation continues to be at risk.

She also warned that entire Native American tribes were at risk of being wiped out; New Mexico is home to an array of Pueblo, Apache and Navajo people.

Shortly after, she ordered businesses shuttered, and encouraged people to stay home. Public schools were required to adopt distance learning. She resisted pressure from churches to reopen, and ordered every New Mexican to wear a mask in public. Though they havent been universally popular, her actions have paid dividends.

The state is also harnessing the scientific power of two national nuclear laboratories to process still more coronavirus tests. Normally dealing in physics to secretively maintain the nations nuclear weapons arsenal, Los Alamos and Sandia national laboratories will not just test, but model and even help search for a vaccine for the virus.

With a little more than 3,200 cases, New Mexicos infection rate is on par with similarly sized states like Nebraska and Kansas. But with over 65,000 tests so far outstripping richer Texas on a per capita basis the death rate has remained lower than neighboring Colorado or nearby Nevada. A total of 112 people have died in New Mexico, according to state data.

She made our case, Tim Harman, a gallery owner in Santa Fe, said of the governor. She also gave us lots of information quickly, on websites and in email. New Mexico is a lot like a small boat. Were just not that big. And so, we could turn the boat quickly. We feel really good.

During a car trip across the eastern half of the state, the radio crackled with state public service announcements urging people to stay home a message echoed in a follow-up announcement by Baptist preachers in the mountain town of Ruidoso, saying they would conduct drive-in services. But we want everyone to stay in their car, their commercial urged.

At a briefing last week in Santa Fe, Ms. Lujan Grisham did something that still has eluded Mr. Trump: She showed compassion. Even as her administration announced that the state would have enough hospital beds, and was considering steps to open up the economy, she began by mourning the dead.

I do want people to know that we mourn with you, she said. Its incredibly hurtful to know we lose anyone in this state to this unfair, invisible, deadly threat.

Then, as other states told businesses to open with little data, she refused to lift the stay-at-home order. Her stellar performance during the crisis has raised her as a possible vice presidential running mate alongside Joe Biden.

New Mexico isnt out of the proverbial woods yet; infections rage on the Navajo reservation in the western part of the state, stretching into Arizona, with infection rates akin to New York. Already, Navajo officials have recorded nearly 1,200 infections and the entire Navajo police force is being tested.

And, even with a massive death toll averted, she and the states 2.2 million people face economic devastation. This is the governors next challenge.

She has ordered the horseracing industry shut down; it normally generates hundreds of millions of tourist and gambling dollars annually. Sunland Park has been feeding stable workers daily with zero customers, according to Julie Farr, the tracks in-house racing analyst. Were fierce competitors on the track, she said. But when something goes wrong we take care of each other.

Casinos from the Texas border to Colorado are closed. So are liquor stores and gun shops. In the north, Santa Fes 99th annual Indian Market has been postponed for a year. In the southeast, the oil and gas patch lies crushed by record low prices.

Meanwhile the state has one of the lowest median incomes in America. And rural hospitals here are going broke after being ordered to cancel procedures to make way for coronavirus cases.

Making things worse, New Mexico is also politically divided. The eastern part of the state and the southwest are deep-red Republican, although the state government is run by Democrats, who also occupy every seat in Congress and the Senate. The local government in the town of Grants effectively rebelled by defying the governors orders, daring her to send in the state police, though it later seemed to back off.

Afterward, in repairing a shattered economy, it is likely that New Mexicos leaders will need to at least consider tapping one more secret weapon, the states $23 billion sovereign wealth fund, accumulated over the years from oil and gas royalties. Only a few states and about 80 foreign nations, such as Kuwait and Russia, have such funds. So, as the age of fossil fuel draws to a close, the fund may provide a way out of the economic damage of the crisis and into the future.

Up in Santa Fe, Mr. Harman has taken to building a digital experience of his gallery, Gallery Campeaux. A creative director, photographer and filmmaker by profession, he hopes to make up for the lack of physical presence by visitors, perhaps for years to come. I want to make it as real as possible, he said. In a larger sense, I think, or at least hope, that this whole thing will usher in the future. I do know I want the world to be a better world after this.

Maybe. New Mexico is always full of grit, secrets and, yes, even secret weapons.

Richard Parker is the author of Lone Star Nation: How Texas Will Transform America.

The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. Wed like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And heres our email: letters@nytimes.com.

Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram.

Here is the original post:

How New Mexico Flattened the Coronavirus Curve - The New York Times