💉😷 Data Check: Vaccination Rates Should Reflect 2020 Census Data

Liena Zagare -

When it was announced that NYC had grown to 8.8 million residents a couple of weeks back,  Mayor Bill de Blasio celebrated. The biggest city in America had gotten even bigger. Brooklyn too, had added over 200,000 residents in the last decade, tying with Chicago for the third largest city in America.

But the larger number of residents also means that all those recent benchmark numbers the city has hit, according to the administration, are not quite what they seem, and adjusting the racial composition of the city's data to more accurately reflect what the 2020 Census found may change some numbers for the better, when it comes to vaccination rates among th different populations.

This is the screenshot from today's numbers on the city's Department of Health website, which use the old numbers:

Now, as it happens, according to the 2020 Census the population numbers should be increased by almost a half million people. When we do that, we get lower numbers for vaccination rates, with only Manhattan at over 70% vaccinated:

Now, looking at Brooklyn in particular, the census data noted that the Black population of the borough shrunk significantly over the last decade, as Asian population grew.

Adjusting the data that looks at racial patterns when it comes to getting  vaccinated, like the table below, may potentially result in better overall numbers - smaller % of a larger population can be a larger % of a smaller one. Is it likely that every eligible Asian kid has been vaccinated in Brooklyn?

The NYC DOH chart above still shows low vaccination rates among Black and White Brooklyn residents, especially young ones, as it did a few weeks back.

Today's screenshot from the NYC DOH portal shows that of the 12-17-year-old White kids in Brooklyn, less than a quarter have received the vaccine, while the number of Black kids mirrors that of their parents (18-44 age group) at about 1/3 vaccinated.

But when we talk about public schools, let's remember that not all of the city's children attend public schools, though about 75% do, and that of those, over 40% are Hispanic, while White and Asian kids are at about 15%, and Black kids at 25%. In fact, less than 50% of all White kids in the city attend a public school at all.