Rural vaccination rate rose a little last week, but more slowly even though reported infections were surging

Rural/urban vaccination rates as of July 22, compared to the national average and adjusted to account for vaccinations not assigned to specific counties. Map by The Daily Yonder; click the image to enlarge it or here for the interactive version.

The rural coronavirus vaccination rate rose a little last week, but more slowly than in previous weeks even though infections from the much more contagious Delta variant were surging.

About 151,000 rural residents completed their coronavirus immunization last week, "about half the number of new rural vaccinations that occurred two weeks ago. The number of new vaccinations in metropolitan counties also declined last week, dropping by about 40 percent," Tim Murphy and Tim Marema report for The Daily Yonder. "As of July 22, 35.8% of the rural population was completely vaccinated for Covid-19. That’s an increase of 0.3 percentage points from the previous weeks. In mid-April, the rural vaccination rate was increasing by more than 2 percentage points a week."

The vaccination rate in metropolitan counties was 46.8% last week, up 0.6 percentage points from the week before, Murphy and Marema report. Click here for more charts, regional analysis, and an interactive county-level map from the Yonder.