It’s been five years since our lives were turned upside down by COVID-19.
The Great Bend Tribune Sunday edition on May 24, 2020 noted that Barton County had recorded 45 positive cases by then – up from 32 the previous week. Twenty-eight of the cases were still active.
The pandemic and all of the restrictions that followed began well before May of 2020. Our first story was in February.
The Courthouse was closed to the public beginning at 5 p.m. Friday, March 20, “until further notice.” Employees would continue to work and monitor phone lines. Officials were not yet aware of any active cases in Barton County, but that month the commission approved a Declaration of a State of Local Public Health Emergency.
Schools had closed back in March. Great Bend High School was planning to host a graduation ceremony on June 27, with chairs spaced 6 feet apart at Memorial Stadium. If that didn’t work there was an alternate plan for a drive-up graduation in front of the high school.
Valedictorian Bayle Jolene Sandy spoke at the ceremony. “It’s safe to say our generation is graduating into a world with profound challenges,” she said. “We can be the change that our world needs.”
A few days later, Gov. Laura Kelly gave an executive order stating Kansans needed to wear masks in public. However, counties could opt out of that mandate, and that was what the Barton County Commission decided to do. While acknowledging the value of face coverings, commissioners said mandating them was an administrative overreach that could not be enforced.
The first cases in Barton County seemed few and far between. But by the end of the year, Barton County Administrator Phil Hathcock reported there had been 2,025 positive COVID-19 cases and 21 related deaths in the county as of 8 a.m. Monday, Dec. 28, 2020. That represented 121 new cases and two new deaths since the last report on Dec. 18.
The number of cases would double in the coming year, and the number of deaths tripled. Hospital beds filled.
Then came the vaccine. Remember waiting in line for drive-through vaccinations?
Our weekly “COVID reports” continued into May 2023.
Here we are, five years later. You could say the “true” five-year anniversary was last year, because COVID-19, the disease caused by the new coronavirus SAR-CoV-2, emerged in December 2019. Last December, the Pew Research Center looked at the five-year anniversary and concluded, “The pandemic left few aspects of daily life in America untouched. Three-quarters of Americans say the pandemic took some sort of toll on their own lives. This includes 27% who say it had a major effect and 47% who say it took a minor toll. A large majority of U.S. Adults have had COVID-19 at some point, and more than 1 million Americans died from it.”
There were moments when the pandemic brought us closer together, even as we remained socially distant. We’re still questioning if the decisions made were the right ones and even if the information we received was sound. We’ve moved on, for the most part, and yet we are forever changed.
