TORONTO -- The U.S. is still far ahead of Canada when it comes to people who are fully vaccinated against COVID-19. But its vaccination rate has slowed considerably, while Canada has just surpassed America when it comes to one-dose vaccines per capita.
As of Friday afternoon, 48.95% of Canada’s total population has received at least one dose, according to CTVNews.ca’s vaccine tracker, compared with 48.2% of the U.S. population, as reported by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
When it comes to full vaccinations, 37.86% of the U.S. population is now fully vaccinated, compared with just 4.83% in Canada as of Friday.
However, the rate of Americans being vaccinated has slowed dramatically.
The CDC says the average daily pace of COVID-19 vaccinations is down almost 50% from a peak in April.
Over the past 7 days, Canada has been vaccinating an average of 0.88% of its population with first doses. Compare that with the U.S., which has been inoculating just 0.24% of its population daily with first doses over the same time period. And while the U.S. is also administering a lot of second doses, its total vaccination rate has declined significantly.
Meanwhile, Canada’s deputy chief public health officer said this week that Canadians could be receiving their second doses sooner than expected. And that we may be on track to “shorten the interval” between first and second doses, thanks to millions more vaccine deliveries expected.
“Canada does not have a one-dose strategy, we’ve always had a two-dose strategy,” Dr. Howard Njoo said Thursday during a press conference. “The issue is about extending the dose interval between the first and second doses, so I think obviously more doses coming to the country very quickly, we’re well on track to offer that second dose.”
Intergovernmental Affiairs Minister Dominic LeBlanc added on Friday that 58 per cent of adults have now received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine. He says the country is on track to administer a first vaccine dose to all eligible Canadians by the end of June, and to fully vaccinate them by September.
Ontario announced Friday that, beginning May 24, it would start administering second doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine for those who received their first dose between March 10 and March 19. People can choose to receive their second dose as early as 10 weeks after the initial dose. The announcement comes as tens of thousands of AstraZeneca doses were set to expire by the end of May.
Ontario also marked a record-high number of doses given out in a single day on Thursday, with 158,524 vaccines.
Canada is expected to receive a further 1.6 million doses of the AstraZeneca viral vector-based vaccine and is negotiating to procure more doses from the U.S.
Meanwhile, Canada should be receiving up to 36 million doses of Pfizer and Moderna mRNA vaccines in the next two months – with 24.2 million Pfizer and between 10 million and 12 million Moderna expected.
