This SW Missouri city is first jurisdiction to reach 50% vaccination as rest of state lags
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Joplin, a city of about 50,000 people in southwest Missouri, became the first jurisdiction in the state to exceed a vaccination rate of 50%, according to state health data.
Kansas City and St. Louis, the two largest metro areas in the state, still have a ways to go.
Just shy of 42% of Kansas City residents and nearly 39% of St. Louis city residents are fully vaccinated, according to data from the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services.
The state tracks COVID-19 trends using jurisdictional boundaries of local public health agencies. Most of the data is broken down by county, with Joplin, Kansas City and St. Louis — where data is only representative of the city — among the exceptions because the cities have their own local public health agency.
Joplin, which in mid-July was listed as having the highest hospitalization rates per capita in the country, is 50.2% vaccinated. Boone County, where the University of Missouri is located, sits at 49% fully vaccinated.
In Missouri, 44% of the total population has been fully vaccinated, according to state health department data; 51% have initiated vaccination. Across the United States, 51.5% of the population is fully vaccinated, with 60% having started the process, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Joplin hit the latest milestone as the FDA gave full approval to Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine on Monday.
More than 200 million Pfizer doses have been administered in the U.S. — and hundreds of millions more worldwide — since emergency use began in December.
Doctors and scientists have expressed hope that the full FDA approval will motivate those holding out on the vaccine to go in for an appointment.
On Friday, the area encompassing Kansas City, Jackson, Clay and Platte counties in Missouri and Johnson and Wyandotte counties in Kansas added 10 new deaths for a total of 2,462 since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, according to data tracked by The Star.
Last week alone, 39 people across the metro died from the virus, according to health data. To date, more than 174,757 metro residents have been infected.
The Associated Press contributed.
This story was originally published August 23, 2021 at 11:20 AM.
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