Education workers in Catholic school board for Burlington, Oakville & Milton well below average in COVID-19 vaxx rate

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Published October 12, 2021 at 9:59 pm

By the numbers, the Halton District Catholic School Board appears to be well behind the provincial average when it comes to education workers being fully vaccinated against COVID-19.

In fact, an aggregation of publicly available disclosure about education workers’ vaccine status shows a disparity between the HDCSB and its public counterpart, the Halton District School Board. The latter’s disclosure about attestations is more recent, but that it likely not enough to explain an estimated 11.3 per cent difference.

Sue Gowans, a health researcher and public education advocated, cross-references school boards’ disclosure against staffing levels, in an attempt to determine actual vaccine uptake. Her data contains columns for total staff and the staff who have informed their employers of their vaccination status (also known as attestations).

The Halton Catholic board last provided info about attestations on Sept. 29. Based on what was available, Gowans estimates only 74.9 per cent of the board’s staff were fully vaccinated against the respiratory virus. The Conseil scolaire public du Grand Nord de l’Ontario in the Sudbury, Ont., area was the only board in the province which has reported lower coverage since Halton Catholic’s last update. The Grand Nord board reported 74.5 per cent uptake on Oct. 1.

The Halton public board last provided info on Oct. 6 and is believed to have 86.2 per cent of education workers fully vaccinated. That is just above the provincial average of 83.8.

The fully-vaxxed status among those who have provided their status to the boards are much closer: 94.2 per cent in HDSB, and 92.3 in HCDSB.

The data includes reports from 68 out of the 76 school boards in Ontario. Thirteen boards have a vaccine uptake above 90 per cent among staff members — eight public, and five Catholic.

Eleven boards were under 80 per cent at their last update. Three were public, and eight were Catholic.

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