COVID-19 cases disproportionately impacting Indigenous communities in B.C. – CTV News
Oct. 18, 2021
Vancouver –
The fourth wave of the COVID-19 pandemic is having a major impact on Indigenous communities, even though members were among the first to be vaccinated in B.C.
According to the First Nations Health Authority, 14 per cent of hospitalized patients are Indigenous, even though First Nations people make up just over three per cent of B.C.’s population.
“We are definitely seeing a differential impact right now,” Shannon McDonald, acting chief medical officer of FNHA, told CTV News Vancouver.
McDonald says of the more than 5,000 active COVID-19 cases in B.C., 478 are in First Nations communities, which is about nine per cent. About a third of those people have been double vaccinated. Additionally, about 20 per cent of those receiving treatment in hospital are also double vaccinated.
