LAS VEGAS, Nev. (FOX5) – Tuesday marks five years since the World Health Organization declared Covid-19 a pandemic. On St. Patrick’s Day in 2020, then Nevada Governor Steve Sisolak said all non-essential business in the state must close to stop the virus spread. Overnight, the Strip became a ghost town. Doors normally open 24/7 were locked. Schools and businesses were closed. Testing sites quickly popped up everywhere, then mass vaccination sites. The vaccine was offered first to the most vulnerable groups.
All casinos throughout Nevada closed for 78 days, some never reopened. It was not until June 4, 2020, casinos were allowed to resume operations. Nevada’s workforce lost $15 billion according to a state report. While most things have rebounded since the pandemic, there are lingering impacts and lives forever changed.
According to a comprehensive 83-page report by the State of Nevada, the impact on health was massive. More than 900,000 Nevadans had confirmed cases of Covid and more than 12,000 died from it. Nevada estimates 95,000 potential years of life were lost.
Krystal Robinson, a second-year medical student at Touro University in Henderson, is now studying the impact of the pandemic on both physical and mental health and can reflect on her own experience.
“I started working in the ER a couple months before the pandemic. We weren’t wearing masks. Everything was normal. And then Covid hit so we had the gradual change of everyone started wearing masks, started seeing really sick patients,” Robinson recounted.
According to the Pew Research Center, younger generations report a greater impact. In their newly released survey, adults under age 50 were more likely than their older counterparts to say Covid-19 took a major toll on their lives and to say they haven’t yet fully recovered from the pandemic.
According to the Nevada report, academic assessments still reflect learning loss. The state found elementary aged students took the biggest hit. Robinson also points out the lasting impact of social isolation on her peers.
COVID-19 Impact Report – April 2024
“The college level and the high school students were really affected the most when they had to shut down and do school and everything online. It’s a really big shift for them, a lot of didn’t get to have their senior year and graduation…that was really disheartening to see,” Robinson shared. Robison will present the findings of her Covid impact survey in May at Touro University Research Day.
The World Health Organization declared an end to the pandemic in May of 2023, but Covid has never entirely gone away and likely never will. In the last six weeks, twelve people have died from Covid in Southern Nevada.
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