Data suggests Canada is rolling out COVID-19 vaccines at a slower rate than peers

TORONTO – There’s no shortage of supply but data shows that every province in Canada is dragging its heels when it comes to administering COVID-19 vaccines.

Some doctors in this country are calling for immunization efforts to be sped up, with numbers showing no province has administered more than 50 per cent of the vaccine doses it has received so far.

Data compiled by the COVID-19 Canada Open Data Working Group reveals Canada is administering vaccines at a slower pace than some of its peer countries.

Britain, the United States, and Germany have all inoculated a larger share of their populations, despite Canada being one of the first to start authorizing vaccines.

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As of Jan. 3, Canada has only administered 0.31 vaccines for every 100 residents, well behind Israel, which leads the world in inoculations at 14 per 100 people.

Britain is at about 1.4 per 100, while the U.S. is at about 1.3 per 100 residents.

Nathan Stall, a geriatrician at Toronto’s Sinai Health System, tells the Globe and Mail, provinces need to start treating vaccine administration like the emergency it is.

Ontario has administered the most total doses of any province — nearly 42,000 — but that’s the fewest per capita. The province’s top doctor says that is an undercount because it doesn’t include injections of the Moderna vaccine.

On Monday, B.C. announced it plans to have about 150,000 British Columbians immunized by February, starting with those who need protection the most before moving to a wider distribution.

As of Sunday, Provincial Health Officer Dr. Bonnie Henry said 24,139 British Columbians had received COVID-19 vaccines.

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