DENVER — Tuesday marked five years since the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the coronavirus outbreak a pandemic.
Colorado Gov. Jared Polis said at a press conference at the State Capitol that day, “We are likely on the verge of a tipping point where we will see more community spread in the days and weeks ahead.”
Those days and weeks turned into months and months of masks, case counts, shutdowns and tragic deaths. Coloradans remember it well.
“Immediately I thought, ‘Whoa, we're all by ourselves. We can't go places. We can't meet together,’” Mary Goodwin told Denver7.
“All my friends and I were freaking out because we were like, 'Oh, my god… We're never coming back to school,'” said former University of Colorado student Cali Kyle.
EJ Hollins reflected on seeing her brother struggle to recover from COVID-19.
“That was not a good time,” she recalled. “And I was actually living with him, so having to see him go through that and, you know, it was painful. But he got through it.”
- Watch one of our first reports on COVID-19 in the video player below
Schools from pre-K through college went online only in 2020. Anna Helfrich, the lead dietician at the University of Colorado Boulder’s Wardenburg Health Center, told Denver7 that the disruption to learning is just one of the effects still being felt today.
“[Students] lost that comfort and control that social gatherings and those routines brought, so that's where we see that sharp increase in mental health concerns,” she said, adding that campuses are still seeing food insecurity and eating disorders as part of quarantine’s ripple effect. “Grocery stores closing early, uncertainty that the pandemic created, we definitely still see that lingering effect of students normalizing going hours without eating as a normal behavior."
Helfrich said current students at CU Boulder have several resources to address their physical and mental health.
But in general, rediscovering a routine and community has helped many overcome the struggles brought on by the pandemic. Kyle did so at her local gym.
“A socialization standpoint was back,” she said. “Even though everyone was in masks, you're still in this, like, close-knit room and by people. And I think it was like, ‘Okay, I'm ready to start just being around other people again.’”
Kyle now owns a franchise of that gym, PVOLVE, in Denver.
Others said the life-changing pandemic also brought some good changes.
“Zoom has been a nice thing for my family,” said Goodwin. “We keep in touch that way, too.”
“I was able to go and spend a lot of time with my mom,” said Hollins. “It made me really appreciate life more, COVID did.”
- View a timeline of coronavirus in Colorado below
