Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham strongly urged President Donald Trump on Monday to provide more resources to combat the COVID-19 virus, voicing frustration that the federal government was impeding New Mexico’s ability to respond to the crisis and provide testing.
“If one state doesn’t get the resources and materials they need, the entire nation continues to be at risk,” Lujan Grisham told the president on a call with a group of governors, according to her office.
The call came shortly before New Mexico confirmed four more cases of coronavirus, bringing the state’s total to 21. All the new cases are in Bernalillo County, which now has 14 of the state’s cases.
New Mexico also significantly ramped up testing, reporting 1,270 total tests Monday from 583 reported Sunday.
Virus-related news came fast and furious Monday.
Lujan Grisham issued five executive orders authorizing $3.25 million in emergency response and disaster relief funding; additional closures of popular businesses and even the postponement of the much-beloved Holy Week pilgrimage to Chimayó were announced; a well-known Santa Fe employer confirmed one of its workers tested positive for the virus; and the congressman who represents Northern New Mexico chose to self-quarantine.
The new cases announced Monday were a 20-year-old man, two 30-year-old women and an 80-year-old man. None of the state’s confirmed cases has been fatal. The Department of Health did not respond when asked Monday how many people with the virus were hospitalized or in intensive care.
Lujan Grisham’s exchange with the president came after Trump reportedly told governors on the call to try to obtain respirators and other equipment on their own — fueling angry objections by New Mexico’s governor and Gov. Jay Inslee of Washington, whose state has been at the forefront of the crisis.
“We will be backing you, but try getting it yourselves,” Trump said on the call, according to the New York Times, which first reported the conversation.
Lujan Grisham spokesman Tripp Stelnicki said the governor was frustrated on the call that the federal government was “encouraging states to figure out materials on their own and with private partners” yet on the other hand “hamstringing some of our own efforts here in New Mexico to do exactly that with TriCore.”
The state announced last week that Albuquerque-based TriCore Reference Laboratories was providing testing for the virus. Officials said the company had 5,000 COVID-19 tests in New Mexico as of Thursday and was expecting to double that number.
Lujan Grisham wants to be able to use a machine at TriCore that can rapidly increase the number of tests that can be performed on a daily basis, as well as buy a second machine. The state needs to purchase materials in order to do so but was put in a queue by the federal government and not prioritized, the Governor’s Office said.
The governor requested a follow-up call with Vice President Mike Pence, who called her and assured her New Mexico would get what it needed to “ramp up testing further,” Stelnicki said.
Monday’s call with the president wasn’t the first time Lujan Grisham has expressed frustration at the Trump administration’s handling of the pandemic. She has said the federal government’s delay in providing access to testing and resources was causing states to compete for resources.
“They delayed testing, they delayed access, the stuff we need to do testing,” she told reporters Friday. “So now all states, including New Mexico, are sort of caught in that dynamic.”
She also echoed widespread criticism that the administration bungled its initial response to the outbreak and squandered crucial time when it could have acted more quickly to stem the spread of the virus.
“I don’t think the CDC and HHS and the federal government were as clear as they should have been about how contagious this virus is and about the virility of this virus and what the death rates can be like,” she said on Friday, referring to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
Trump repeatedly downplayed the seriousness of the outbreak in its early weeks and months, calling it “well under control” and a “very little problem” the same day in late January when the World Health Organization announced it was “public health emergency of international concern.” Last week, he gave an Oval Office speech containing a number of errors and he has disregarded CDC guidelines by shaking hands in public.
In the early days of the outbreak, the U.S. chose not to use tests provided to dozens of countries by the WHO and instead relied on the CDC to create its own test. But the test the agency developed had a technical flaw, a damaging setback for efforts across the country to track the spread of the disease.
As a result of these and other factors, U.S. testing figures have been woefully low. For instance, South Korea had performed nearly 250,000 tests as of March 13 compared to only around 20,000 in the U.S., according to independent researchers at the COVID Tracking Project. Those numbers become even more stark when considering the U.S. population is more than six times that of South Korea’s.
Total U.S. testing had risen to over 43,000 by Monday. There were just over 4,300 confirmed cases nationwide with 79 deaths as of Monday evening, according to the New York Times.
In New Mexico, the executive orders issued by Lujan Grisham on Monday authorize $750,000 each for the following state agencies: the Department of Health, the Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Management, the Public Education Department, and the Children, Youth and Families Department. There also is an additional $250,000 for the New Mexico National Guard.
State officials will use the funds for public health measures, humanitarian relief and to help families affected by the closure of schools. The money will come from the state’s general fund, and any unused portions will revert to the fund.
Santa Fe-based Meow Wolf confirmed Monday that one of its employees tested positive for the virus Friday and was being quarantined and monitored. The company said the employee was “asymptomatic during their time interacting with employees” and is a corporate employee who “does not interface with the guests of the House of Eternal Return exhibition.”
“Based on the employee’s geography, timeline and the science of what is known about transmission, the state of New Mexico believes there is a very low probability of transmission to other employees or the community,” said Didi Bethurum, the company’s vice president of marketing.
”Individuals identified as having been in close proximity to the employee remain asymptomatic, but as an extra precaution, they will also be quarantined and monitored for the next 14 days,” she added.
Last week, Meow Wolf closed its Santa Fe exhibit through March 31 and canceled all events through April 15.
Also on Monday, U.S. Rep. Ben Ray Luján, D-N.M., said he planned to self-quarantine after a brief interaction with a person who later tested positive for COVID-19. Luján said he is not exhibiting any symptoms, and the individual he came into contact with had no symptoms at the time, his office said.
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