Canada just surpassed us on vaccinations. Good for them, and shame on us

[brooklynite]

Los Angeles Times

GORDON BAY, Canada — Three months ago, Canada, which has no domestic manufacturer of COVID-19 vaccines, lagged far behind the United States in immunizations. Only 3% of its population was fully vaccinated. Canadians watched glumly as friends and relatives south of the border lined up for shots, while residents of Toronto and Montreal suffered repeated lockdowns.

No longer. Last month, Canada blew past the United States in the share of its population that’s fully vaccinated — 58% as of Friday, versus 49% in the U.S. — to take first place among the seven big industrial democracies. (The United States ranks sixth, ahead of only Japan.)

How did Canada, the country that most closely resembles the United States, do so much better, even though it had to wait longer for Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna to deliver their vaccines?

The simple answer is that in Canada, the pandemic didn’t become a politically polarized issue, as it did in the United States.

Canada’s major political parties, including the opposition Conservatives, joined early in full-throated support of mass vaccination. Leading politicians didn’t dismiss immunization as unnecessary, deride mask mandates or attack scientists.

[ansible]

1. It's nice having an entire country with even less people than California

[LisaL]

2. The reason they got higher proportion of their people vaccinated is not because

they have less people than us, but because we have a large number of people refusing to get vaccinated.

[Sneederbunk]

3. The US is far more tolerable of its moron quotient.

[Bev54]

5. Yes a recent poll in Canada reported that there is only

8% of Canadians that said they will not get vaccinated. Unfortunately I have 2 family members in that 8%. That has improved considerably over the past month, since the delta variant, there was about 15-20% hesitancy before.

[bif]

4. Gotta love our neighbors to the south!

God I love Canada and Canadians!

[Hortensis]

6. :) American trumpist types take pride in not doing what Democrats do, and

their Canadian counterparts take pride in refusing to behave like Americans. Meanwhile, sensible people in both nations get vaccinated between it's the smart and moral thing to do.

Whatever works. I'm very glad they have the vaccine supply they need now.

[Hiawatha Pete]

7. We are now at over 80% of eligible people vaccinated with their first dose

and approximately 64 per cent fully vaccinated:

Canada reaches major vaccine campaign milestone:
https://pm.gc.ca/en/news/news-releases/2021/07/27/canada-reaches-major-vaccine-campaign-milestone