The way the Mississippi National Guard was utilized during the pandemic is nothing short of historic. But Lt. Colonel Jeremy Parker told SuperTalk Mississippi this was an inter-agency response. “It was the National Guard with the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency (MEMA) with the Mississippi Department of Health as the lead agency. They really provided the overall direction for the response, MEMA resourced the tents, the heaters. Everything that you saw on-site was provided through MEMA.”
Parker told us it was very important that they continue their military training concurrent with the response. That meant long hours for National Guard members, who would go back and forth between their military mission and the COVID response without a break.
The National Guard has administered over 225-thousand COVID tests, 765-thousand doses of vaccine and delivered over 58-million medical and non-medical pieces of personal protection equipment over the course of the mission, which wrapped up July 15th.
