New map tracks how many people are vaccinated in Ontario by region

The City of Toronto is celebrating an important milestone today in its COVID-19 vaccination strategy: Nearly 70 per cent of all adults in the city have now received at least one dose.

As of Tuesday morning, the city and its vaccination partners are reporting that at least 1,778,644 people over 18 in Toronto have now receive at least shot of a COVID-19 vaccine, and this number is expected to surpass more than 70 per cent of all 2.9 million residents by end of day.

"Passing this first-dose vaccination milestone is evidence that Torontonians have confidence in the COVID-19 vaccines and are doing their part in fighting the pandemic," said the city's medical officer of health, Dr. Eileen de Villa, in a release announcing the news on Tuesday.

"Vaccination is vital to sustaining the downward trends in COVID-19 that we are starting to see in our city. With every dose, Toronto is choosing protection and peace of mind."

With every dose, we're also contributing to higher provincewide vaccination rates — one of the key metrics being used to decide when Ontario can enter and move through the government's 3 Step Road to Reopening framework.

Long story short, rising vaccination rates will benefit everyone, but some areas of the province are faring better than others when it comes to getting vaxxed (and not necessarily through any fault of their own.)

Which postal codes have the highest first dose vaccination coverage? Here they are. pic.twitter.com/n4EFzEzKlG

— 🇨🇦 Bill Comeau Crush the Curve 📉 (@Billius27) May 31, 2021

Bill Comeau, a retired mathematical statistician who's been producing incredible COVID-19 data visualizations for Ontario and Canada since the pandemic hit, just released an updated version of his interactive postal code maps for test positivity and first dose percentages provincewide.

Organized by the first three letters of postal codes (or Forward Sortation Area Codes [FSAs]), the latter map reveals some pretty stark contrasts between Toronto and the rest of Ontario, as well as between specific Toronto neighbourhoods.

Keep in mind when looking at the map that green = good (as in more than 60 per cent of people vaccinated with at least one dose) while red = not so good (as in less than 40 per cent of people with at least one dose).

While the map isn't 100 per cent realtime accurate due to factors such as public health reporting data delays, the overall graphics paint an unpretty picture, putting Toronto well ahead of many other Ontario regions in terms of vaccines.

But not all of them.

The N7W area in Southeast Sarnia in Ontario boasted the highest number of first-dose vaccinations administered proportionate to its population during the week ending May 24, with 68.4 per cent of people vaccinated.

In second place with 67.7 per cent of people vaccinated (based on data from the ICES website and OHIP) was the M8X area (Kingsway / Montgomery Road / Old Mill North, Etobicoke), followed by  M4G (Leaside, East York) and M5M (Bedford Park / Lawrence Manor East, North York).

At the very bottom of the list is P0V, a Northwestern Ontario FSA where only 19.7 per cent of residents have recieved at least one shot of a vaccine to date. The K8H area of Petawawa, Ontario, has the second-lowest rate of vaccination with a listing of 29.5 per cent.

While not all regions are seeing people vaccinated at the same rate, the situation is promising overall: As of Tuesday morning, more than 9 million Ontario residents have been vaccinated, with one million shots administered over the past eight days alone.

New cases are furthermore falling steadily, with only 699 positives reported in Ontario this morning out of 20,300 tests.

Here's to hoping for more momentum, whether that means increased supply and access to vaccines or more public education, as we move toward reopening and a return to something resembling normalcy.