FARGO — March 11, 2025 is the five-year anniversary of North Dakota’s first confirmed case of COVID-19. What we didn’t know then is that it was the first of hundreds of thousands of cases for the state, and eventually, more than 100 million in America.

The state’s first case of Coronavirus was reported five years ago in Ward County.

In WDAY News’s 6 p.m. broadcast on March 11, 2020, there were reported supply shortages across the region. Stores across Fargo were out of toilet paper, and panic shopping was underway in Grand Forks.

The landscape of shortages changed dramatically over the pandemic, contributing to the global supply chain crisis that began in earnest the following year.

That same day, the Fargo VA began its first day of Coronavirus screenings, and West Fargo Public Schools canceled all out of state travel in March.

A particularly dramatic announcement came just two days after North Dakota reported its first COVID case. The North Dakota High School Activities Association suspended the winter tournament schedule. At that time, it was one of the few high school tournaments going on in the country. Those tournaments were eventually canceled for the year.

Area colleges transitioned to online classes. Then-Gov. Doug Burgum eventually announced K-12 schools would close for five days beginning March 16, while officials determined next steps. Classes resumed online on April 1 in Fargo. They remained online for the rest of the school year.

On March 13, President Donald Trump declared a national public emergency. Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and Burgum followed suit the same day.

“We’re taking a pragmatic, proactive, positive step, and again acting out of facts not out of fear,” Burgum said at the time.

Within a week, both governors ordered the closure of bars, restaurants and other entertainment venues via executive order. At the time, many of these were described as temporary measures. But as we all know, dramatic changes to our daily lives continued for years.

According to the latest data from the North Dakota Health and Human Services Vaccine Dashboard, just 10.5% of all people aged six months and older have been vaccinated for the 2024-2025 respiratory season. A total of 27.7% are up to date on their seasonal flu vaccinations.

Grand Forks Public Health epidemiologist Shawn McBride says the pandemic led to a lot of self reflection for people working in public health.

“We certainly saw an erosion of trust in public health agencies and health care providers during the pandemic,” McBride said.

He says the way people receive information has changed over time, and public health organizations need to adapt to those changes.

When it comes to improving the state vaccination rate, McBride points to reducing obstacles people may encounter when getting vaccinated.

“People need to take time off of work, or kids need to get away from school,” McBride said. “Sometimes those are things that are barriers that just don’t get people to go get that immunization. We need to make it easy for people, provide plenty of opportunities, and also make sure that there’s not a cost barrier as well.”

McBride emphasized that vaccines are safe, and effective, citing CDC data from a preliminary analysis of COVID-19 vaccine effectiveness over the last respiratory season.

“it reduced the risk of hospitalizations by 45 to 46%,” McBride said. “In my mind, that’s a significant risk reduction. And we do all kinds of things every day to reduce our risk. We put a seat belt on, we make sure we’re driving the speed limit, or we’re asking kids to put on a bike helmet. It’s about reducing the overall risk to have severe outcomes from things when we encounter them.”

According to the CDC, there have been over 111 million cases of COVID-19 in the United States since 2020. Over 1.2 million Americans have died.