Fresno County reaches 1 million COVID shots among residents. Who’s still unvaccinated?
Fresno County reached a milestone of 1 million doses of coronavirus vaccine administered to residents on Wednesday – nine months to the day since the first COVID-19 shots became available in the county.
Between first and second doses of Pfizer and Moderna vaccines, single shots of Johnson & Johnson vaccine, and booster shots for people with compromised immune systems, a total of 1,000,860 shots have been injected into the arms of residents since Dec. 15.
Of Fresno County’s overall estimated population of 1,032,227 people, the latest data from the California Department of Public Health shows just under 46% – about 474,000 – are now “fully vaccinated,” at least two weeks beyond completing both shots of the two-dose regimens or a one-dose shot from Johnson & Johnson. About 83,000 others are partially vaccinated with one dose of the two-shot Pfizer or Moderna vaccines.
Still, that leaves more than 46% of the county’s residents – more than 475,000 people, including about 190,000 children under the age of 12 for whom vaccines are not approved – who have yet to receive even one shot.
The vaccination rates in Fresno County and neighboring counties in the central San Joaquin Valley lag behind the statewide average, and concern health officials because data shows that while some “breakthrough infections” by the highly contagious delta variant of COVID-19 are happening among people who are fully vaccinated, “the vast majority” of serious illnesses resulting in hospitalizations and deaths are among people who have not gotten their shots, said Dr. Rais Vohra, interim health officer with the Fresno County Department of Public Health.
Vohra described increases in new coronavirus infections and hospitalizations in Fresno County as a “pandemic of the unvaccinated.”
The largest group of people who are eligible to receive shots yet remain unvaccinated are almost 212,000 Hispanic residents in Fresno County. That’s despite efforts by the county Department of Public Health and community organizations to promote the shots through mobile clinics in largely Latino neighborhoods and rural vaccine events in outlying communities.
Health officials also offered pop-up vaccination clinics for agricultural workers earlier this year. Still, almost 48% of the Latino population is unvaccinated.
The highest rate of unvaccinated residents, by percentage of the eligible population, is among Fresno County’s African American community. Almost 58% of the Black population over the age of 12 have yet to receive even one shot – twice as many as the 28.9% who are fully vaccinated.
The lagging vaccination rates among African Americans defies the county’s efforts, as well as those by a coalition of neighborhood and community organizations, to overcome vaccine hesitancy in parts of Fresno and the county with higher concentrations of Black residents, including clinics earlier this year at Rutherford B. Gaston Middle School in the heart of southwest Fresno.
One of the fastest-growing segments of the vaccinated population are children ages 12 to 17, who only became eligible for Pfizer shots in May under the U.S. Food & Drug Administration’s emergency-use authorization.
In about four months, almost 40% of that age group has been fully vaccinated, and almost 49% have gotten at least one dose of vaccine. And the pace of shots has accelerated with the start of the 2021-22 school year.
Across the counties of the central San Joaquin Valley, the percentages of unvaccinated residents range from 46.1% in Fresno County to more than 60% in Kings County. Only three of California’s 58 counties have a larger percentage of unvaccinated residents than Kings County.
Statewide, more than 57% of California residents are fully vaccinated, while 35% are wholly unvaccinated.
Pfizer’s two-dose vaccine received full approval from the FDA in August for people ages 18 and older, graduating from the emergency-use authorization the shots have had since December.
Also in August, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and the FDA recommended that people with compromised immune systems get a third vaccine dose to ensure continued protection against COVID-19.
The Associated Press reported that science and health advisors to the FDA will meet Friday to discuss whether there’s enough proof that a booster dose of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine is safe and effective — the first step toward deciding which Americans need one and when.
The CDC says real-world data show protection against severe illness, hospitalizations and deaths is holding strong, the AP reported Thursday. But in one recent study, protection against infection slipped as the delta variant hit: It was 91% in the spring but 78% in June and July. The CDC also has seen a hint that for people 75 and older, protection against hospitalizations slightly declined in the summer.
This story was originally published September 16, 2021 at 2:21 PM.
