THURSDAY, OCTOBER 14, 2021
145th Year, No. 154
WINNER OF 16 ONPA AWARDS IN 2021
OCTOBER 13–20,
2021
WWW.GOE ASTERNOR
Celebrate
Harvest Festi
quilt show val,
PAGE 3
Explore
Pumpkin
patches
EGON.COM
T wists
and turn
n s
Find your way
the
Echo Corn Maz in
e
$1.50
PAG E 8
PAGE 12
INSIDE
Experiment
Chemistry at the
farmers mark
et
CHECK OUT PUMPKIN PATCHES AND THE ECHO CORN MAZE
PAGE 18
Beth Staff ord/Contrib
uted image
The Echo Corn
Maze and Pumpkin
Patch is open througout
corn maze, a smaller
straw bale maze,
October with an
a mini corn maze,
8-acre
a pumpkin patch
and more.
COMMUNITY SPIRIT
Picking pumpkins benefi ts struggling infant girl
Kathy Aney/East Oregonian
Laylah Lucas, junior at Hermiston High
School and mental health advocate, poses
for a portrait Monday, Oct. 11, 2021. She
struggles with depression and anxiety,
which she attributes in part to experiences
on social media.
Equally good
and equally
horrible
Ben Lonergan/East Oregonian
Mikayla and Kyle Rakestraw and their children Parker and Blakely pose for a portrait Saturday, Oct. 9, 2021, at the Hendricks Boys’ Pumpkin
Patch in Milton- Freewater.
By BRYCE DOLE
East Oregonian
MILTON-FREEWATER — A family in
Milton-Freewater is holding a pumpkin patch
fundraiser for multiple weeks to support a
struggling infant girl.
Parker Rakestraw, a little more than a year
old, has suff ered from brain damage since
birth. She is the daughter of Mikayla and Kyle
Rakestraw.
Mikayla Rakestraw, a hair stylist from
Milton-Freewater, received an emergency
fl ight to Sacred Heart Children’s Hospital in
Spokane last May when her water broke at
26 weeks.
“I was kind of in shock,” Rakestraw said.
“I didn’t pack a bag. I didn’t know what to
expect. I should have known I was having
a baby, but I didn’t think it was happening.”
Doctors placed Rakestraw on bed rest for
12 days while they monitored her unborn
daughter. Then, she went into labor, but
doctors told her she had an infection. At
around 1 a.m., they decided she would need
an emergency cesarean section. Her husband
still was at home.
“It was defi nitely scary,” she said. “And he
was defi nitely disappointed that he wouldn’t
make it.”
Parker was born at just 2 pounds, 8 ounces
and a tic more than 14 inches in length. The
hospital placed her into its neonatal intensive
care unit, where for 18 hours she had to breath
with a ventilator. After nine days, doctors
conducted a routine brain ultrasound and
found her brain was bleeding.
A few days later, the bleeding had wors-
ened and her head had grown. Doctors deter-
mined she had developed hydrocephalus,
and the blood pressure touching her brain
had killed portions of her brain matter. She
Ben Lonergan/East Oregonian
A sign at the Hendricks Boys’ Pumpkin Patch advertises “pumpkins for sale” Saturday, Oct.
9, 2021, in Milton-Freewater.
learned how to drink from a bottle while in
the NICU.
Now, Rakestraw said, little Parker still
doesn’t know how to take a bottle.
Parker has undergone two procedures,
one for the brain bleed and another to place a
permanent shunt in her brain that drains fl uid.
The family goes to regular doctors visits to
ensure Parker’s shunt is working well and
she is stable.
“It was scary,” she said. “I always thought
I would have a normal delivery, like my fi rst.
So this was defi nitely scary — the unknown.”
Kelsey Hend r icks, a book keeper
in Milton-Freewater, heard about the
Rakestraw’s situation and knew she
wanted to help out. A year before, her
family held a pumpkin patch fundraiser
for a young boy with cancer, helping the
family pay for expenses such as medical
bills and fuel. They even helped purchase
iPads for the family’s sons so they could
chat while the young boy was undergoing
chemotherapy.
So she decided to do the same thing for
the Rakestraws.
See Support, Page A7
Social media troubles teens,
increases anxiety, depression
By BRYCE DOLE
and ERICK PETERSON
East Oregonian
UMATILLA COUNTY — For Laylah
Lucas, it all started with YouTube.
At 9 years old, she watched toy reviews
on the popular video platform. Then she
turned to Pinterest to view other artists’
work. Then, in eighth grade, she got a cell-
phone and felt more independent. So, she
started her Instagram account, seeking
connection with other teens.
She started spending more and more
time on social media. She turned to TikTok,
where she fell down rabbit holes, watching
video after video. She was hooked.
Over time, her mental health suff ered.
The Instagram infl uencers, their perfect
lives and bodies, made her feel insecure
about her own life and body. She watched
videos from her friends and felt she always
was missing out. She said she’s bisexual, so
when threats against the LGBTQ commu-
nity spread across social media during
Pride month in June, she was terrifi ed.
“That’s scary, because you don’t know
if that’s true or a rumor,” said Lucas, a
16-year-old Hermiston High School junior
who struggles with depression and anxi-
ety. “And that rumor spread like the plague.
And that’s a lot of mental bog. Because now
you’re afraid. Especially if you’re like me.”
Lucas realized what has long been
understood but has reached the national
spotlight again in recent weeks: Social
media plays a major role in the declining
mental health of teens.
“I feel like if you’re a teen and you say
that you haven’t then you’re lying,” Lucas
said. “It’s impossible to not be intimidated
or insulted or made to feel bad about your-
self because of social media.”
See Media, Page A7
Change in 2020 leaves Oregon hospitals
without guidelines for crisis management
By ALEX WITTWER
EO Media Group
LA GRANDE — Oregon for
years held a standardized triage
principle in its repertoire for a public
health crisis — such as a major earth-
quake or pandemic. But in September
2020, the state left Oregon hospitals
without concrete guidelines for crisis
management and away with its crisis
care guidelines.
That was right before Orego-
nians began to experience the
highest surge of COVID-19 cases,
deaths and hospitalizations, at
least up until recently. The Oregon
Health Authority has not yet given
new guidance in the form of a
“Standard Crisis of Care” docu-
ment, such as those in Idaho or
Alaska. Instead, the OHA asked
hospitals to make their own plans
for rationing care in the event they
become overrun by critical-condi-
tion COVID-19 patients.
While cases have been declining
statewide in the past weeks, infec-
tions in Eastern Oregon Region 9 —
from Morrow County to Malheur
County — have remained steady.
On Sept. 5, the weekly case
rate per 100,000 residents in East-
ern Oregon Region 9 was 524. On
Sept. 25, three weeks later, that case
rate fell slightly to 522 per 100,000,
according to Oregon Health Author-
ity numbers. Statewide, that same
weekly case rate number was just 244
cases per 100,000 residents using the
same OHA data on Sept. 25.
In comparison, the statewide
infection rates for Idaho and Alaska
— two states that have implemented
emergency crisis standard of care
protocols for hospitals — were 464
and 672 cases per 100,000 residents,
respectively, for the same weekly
period, according to data from those
states.
Still, the Oregon Health Authority
rescinded its 66-page, long-standing
“Crisis Care Guidance” document
and published in its place a set of
priorities and ethical considerations,
leaving the question of how to build
a fair and just crisis standard of care
to individual hospitals.
See Hospitals, Page A7
Ben Lonergan/East Oregonian, File
Judith Lindsey enters the room of a
COVID-19 patient in the critical care
unit on Aug. 19, 2021, while working a
night shift at CHI St. Anthony Hospital in
Pendleton. While COVID-19 cases have
declined statewide in recent weeks, hos-
pitals in much of Eastern Oregon during
September saw a steady number of cases.