As Sask. prepares to lift COVID-19 health restrictions, vaccination booster rates drop

As Saskatchewan prepares to lift all COVID-19 health restrictions on Feb. 28, the number of vaccines being administered is declining.

The rates of first and second doses has fallen to a trickle, while third and fourth doses — one of the few areas where Saskatchewan was continuing to see large increases over the past few months — have also slowed. 

The lack of coverage exposes more people to a chance of developing severe COVID-19 symptoms, said Nazeem Muhajarine, an epidemiologist at the University of Saskatchewan.

As of Feb. 13, Health Canada reported 466,787 people in Saskatchewan had at least one booster dose. That's 42.17 per cent of the more than 1.1 million people above the age of five who are eligible to receive a booster dose. 

Alberta is the only province with a lower vaccine coverage rate, sitting at 36.55 per cent of its eligible population.  

The national average is 46.32 per cent.

A reflection of government policy

Muhajarine points to two decisions made by the provincial government as a reason for falling vaccine uptake:

• Premier Scott Moe's false claims that the vaccines no longer reduced the chance of transmission.
• The decision for the province to drop its vaccine passport on Feb.14.

"It's no surprise" rates are falling, Muhajarine said, adding the numbers go hand-in-hand with policy.

The epidemiologist said the vaccine policy helped boost uptake earlier in the pandemic.

Vaccinations increased when Saskatchewan announced a proof of vaccination policy in September and then saw another spike when vaccine eligibility opened up to children in November. 

Muhajarine said its important to continue encouraging everyone to get as many shots as possible.

One of the areas that the province could focus on is children aged five to 11.

Before the province stopped reporting vaccination rates by age on Feb. 7, the rate of uptake in that age group was lower than the general population.

Another option is to hold direct conversations between experts and those who remain vaccine hesitant. 

"We need to get to those kinds of very specific ways of encouraging people with science based information to get a vaccine dose," Muhajarine said. 

A changing picture of vaccination

Saskatchewan once led Canada in terms of booster doses. 

But things are changing. 

At the province's peak of administering booster doses, between Dec. 15 and Dec. 21, Saskatchewan put 58,000 shots in arms.

The uptake has only dropped off from there.

The most recent data provided by the province showed that between Feb. 6 and Feb. 12, the province administered just 11,051 COVID-19 booster doses. 

Administration of unvaccinated individuals getting their first doses in the province is even slower.

Only 4,637 people received a first or second doses between Feb. 6 and Feb. 12.

The drop in vaccine rates comes despite the continued urging from experts and scientists that getting a booster dose is important during the ongoing Omicron-variant-driven wave. 

Vaccination does work and it reduces transmission and the effects of the virus, experts say. 

WATCH | Blue Sky Q&A on COVID-19 with a clinical microbiologist:

During a recent Q&A with CBC News' Blue Sky, microbiologist Dr. Joseph Blondeau said global data shows that although receiving a booster dose isn't a guarantee against infection it will likely help people avoid ending up in the hospital. 

"Clearly being vaccinated and then having the additional booster doses goes a long way to protecting you from hospitalization and from death," Blondeau said.

"I would be remiss if I didn't report that, you know, among those that were hospitalized and died, the vast majority of those individuals sadly were unvaccinated."

Lack of data 

Muhajarine said another thing the province could do to increase the rate COVID-19 boosters is to be transparent with data in the province. 

There's a distinct lack of up-to-date data on COVID-19 in the province and the information that is available is not as useful as material shared earlier in the pandemic. 

Currently, Saskatchewan and Newfoundland are the only regions in the country that do not release data on COVID-19 vaccinations on a regular basis. 

Alberta provides COVID-19 data, including on boosters, on a daily basis by both provincial and local geographic areas. 

Quebec and Ontario release COVID-19 data daily, with the booster data broken down by age and health region. 

Manitoba provides the same data but does it every week day. 

Meanwhile, Saskatchewan's weekly reports no longer provide separate tallies of third or fourth doses that have been administered. Instead, the two figures are aggregated. 

Data broken down by age group is not provided in the weekly reports. 

Health Canada does report the total number of people in Saskatchewan who have had a third dose, but doesn't report fourth doses.

The data reported by both the provincial government in its weekly reports and collected by the Public Health Agency of Canada on its website is out of date, ranging from a few days to more than a week. 

But the latest numbers show a concerning trend.

Saskatchewan has now dropped well below the national average for percentage of the eligible population with a single booster dose. 

Muhajarine said the province needs to go back to regularly reporting the data it collects. 

"To prematurely pivot to less frequent and less complete data reporting in Saskatchewan is, it's really unconscionable," he said.