The BulleTin • Thursday, March 25, 2021 A3
LOCAL, STATE & REGION
LOCAL & STATE BRIEFING
‘WE FAILED THEM’
OSU-Cascades registering high schoolers
for Summer Academy program in August
New data shows disproportionate virus infection rates of Hispanic residents in hard-hit county
BY BRYCE DOLE
East Oregonian
N
ew data released by the
Umatilla County Public
Health Department shows
what was long understood but
had yet to be disclosed — His-
panic residents have been dis-
proportionately infected with
COVID-19 in the county.
Residents reporting His-
panic ethnicity accounted for
41% of Umatilla County’s total
COVID-19 cases in 2020, com-
pared with 34% from non-His-
panic residents and 25% from
residents whose ethnicity was un-
known, according to a report re-
leased by the health department
this week.
In addition, the county’s His-
panic population tested positive
at a rate about three times higher
than non-Hispanic residents in
2020, the data shows.
“We failed them,” said Jose
Garcia, chair of the Hispanic Ad-
visory Committee in Hermiston.
“We failed some communities.
Because for every death that hap-
pened in Umatilla County, there
was a family involved.”
Hispanic or Latino people
make up nearly 28% of Umatilla
County’s population, according
to 2019 U.S. Census data.
“I did anticipate that, just from
everything I’d seen so far,” Halley
Maloy, the county’s epidemiolo-
gist, said of the new data showing
the pandemic’s disproportionate
impact on the Hispanic commu-
nity.
The report, which Maloy as-
sembled over the last several
months, details a variety of trends
and data points related to the
pandemic, from hospitalizations
to reported deaths and infection
rates based on traits like age, gen-
der, race and ethnicity.
Ben Lonergan/East Oregonian photos
ABOVE: A Umatilla County Public Health billboard along U.S. Highway 395
outside of Hermiston encourages people to stay home if they are sick, with
messages in English and Spanish, on March 15. Newly released data from
the health department confirms reports that Hispanic residents have been
disproportionately infected with COIVD-19.
LEFT: Jose Garcia interviews a caller about an experience with COVID-19
during Radio La Ley’s “La Voz Del Pueblo” in January. The Spanish language
radio program aimed to help dispel rumors about COVID-19 and share first-
hand accounts of those who were dealing with the virus.
Similar disparities have been
reported in nearby Morrow
County, where Hispanic resi-
dents have accounted for nearly
57% of the county’s 1,053 total
coronavirus cases, according to
data provided by county officials
on Friday, March 12. And of the
county’s 14 reported deaths, six
were reported from Hispanic res-
idents.
About 38% of Morrow Coun-
ty’s population is Hispanic or
Latino, according to 2019 U.S.
Census data.
Hispanic residents make up a
sizable portion of both Umatilla
and Morrow counties’ essential
workforce, officials from both
counties say, often working in
food factories and other large ag-
ricultural industries where they
are at increased risk of infection,
and in some cases going home to
multi-generational households
afterward.
“They were hit hard by this,”
Joe Fiumara, Umatilla County’s
public health director, said of the
pandemic’s impact on the His-
panic community. “Whether we
didn’t get messaging to them,
whether they (had to) come into
work because they needed a pay-
check or couldn’t do the work
remotely — I think all of those
things play into that. And I think
this data supports those assump-
tions.”
Since the early months of the
pandemic, national data has
shown that Black and Latino
people are infected, hospitalized
and die from COVID-19 at espe-
cially high rates. The disparities
spanned across the country in
hundreds of urban, suburban and
rural areas and counties, and in
all age groups, according to The
New York Times.
Researchers point to socioeco-
nomic status, unequal access to
health care, and workplace ex-
posures in front-line, essential
and critical infrastructure jobs as
factors contributing to such dis-
parities.
Registration for Summer Academy programs
at Oregon State University-Cascades this Au-
gust is now open.
The five-day program includes a choice of ei-
ther business or arts/technology classes, along
with outdoor activities like rock climbing and
floating the Deschutes River.
Incoming high school sophomores, juniors
and seniors can register for the program at the
university’s website, according to an OSU-Cas-
cades press release.
All students who finish one of the five-
day sessions will earn a $500 scholarship to
OSU-Cascades, the release stated.
The two sessions will be held from Aug. 9-13
and Aug. 23-27, the release stated. Registration
costs $599 per student, and space is limited to
60 students.
Oregon auditors: Some COVID-19 deaths
in senior care were preventable
State auditors say Oregon health officials’
failure to adequately prepare for COVID-19
likely contributed to some senior care home
coronavirus deaths early in the pandemic.
The two state agencies responsible for re-
sponding to the pandemic wasted “valuable
time” in the first few months after Oregon’s first
case as they tried to figure out how to work to-
gether, the Secretary of State Oregon Audits Di-
vision found in a report released Wednesday.
More than 90 people eventually died in out-
breaks that began while state agencies were
building a new administrative system.
The Department of Human Services and the
Oregon Health Authority did not plan “basic
elements for responding together,” the auditor’s
office wrote. “These elements were developed
after the response began, delaying actions that
may have prevented illness and death among
long-term care residents and staff.”
About half of all COVID-19 deaths in Ore-
gon were long-term care residents, auditors said,
compared to just over a third nationally. As of
March 14, 1,210 people in congregate care had
died.
Auditors listed a number of suggestions. Go-
ing forward, the state should track how many
workers get vaccinated and find a way to po-
tentially make that data public, citing troubling
trends showing that health care workers have
been declining to get shots.
— Bulletin staff and wire reports
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