There is a rising debate in Spanish Twitter following this tweet by Pedro Sanchez.
The question being: is it true that Spain is first in the world in vaccinations, or is it just the first country in the default selection on this chart?
Due to limited space on our charts and the number of countries in our data, we can't show all countries. We make a default selection based on a mix of criteria, the main one being population (if you can't show everyone, the second-best thing is to show as many people as possible)
Now, are there countries that have vaccinated a higher % than Spain?
For a population > 20 million, there aren't.
For a population > 10 million: Chile, Portugal
For a population > 1 million: UAE, Singapore, Denmark, Uruguay, Qatar
For a population > 100,000: Malta, Iceland
But the bottom line is that Spain has vaccinated a high share of its population (73%), and I think there are more important things than listing which countries have reached 72% or 74%.
More important things, such as the fact that the share in low-income countries is a mere 1%.
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Regarding vaccination speed and comparisons between countries (especially in the EU), some people say that "it doesn't matter how fast you start, what matters is crossing the finish line at the same time".
But that's not at all how an epidemic works. Quick explanation below.
This claim can be summarized by the following chart: both the yellow and the black country arrive at 100% coverage by the same date.
But the country in yellow started very quickly and slowed down, while the country in black started very slowly and then strongly accelerated.
The idea that those two trajectories are equivalent works for many things in life.
For example, if two marathon runners follow those trajectories during a race, they will indeed cross the finish line at the same time, and neither of the two strategies can be said to be "better".
After several years contributing in various ways to the wonderful resource that is @five_books, I officially sent my last newsletter today!
Here's a list of some of my favorite (and most related to my work at @OurWorldInData) interviews that I published between 2018 and 2020.
[Computer science] How do computers work? What is well-crafted code? How do you write an algorithm? @anabellphd, lecturer in the Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Department at MIT, chooses the best books to learn computer science & programming. fivebooks.com/best-books/pro…
[Data science] This new discipline has risen to extreme popularity in the last decade. @rdpeng, Professor of Biostatistics at Johns Hopkins University and founder of one of the largest data science online courses, recommends the best books to dive into it. fivebooks.com/best-books/dat…
The news that the United Kingdom is currently the country with the highest number of daily new COVID-19 deaths (relative to its population) is getting some attention. This chart here is the current "top 20" for the 7-day average number of deaths where the UK is indeed at the top.
Our source for this data is the COVID-19 Data Repository by the Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) at Johns Hopkins University, which most of the world takes its data from: github.com/CSSEGISandData…
If you want to explore this data on daily new COVID-19 deaths (add countries, change the metric, look at a longer time period, etc.), you can do so in our Data Explorer right here: ourworldindata.org/coronavirus-da…
🇺🇸 As vaccination against COVID-19 is rolled out across the United States, we publish today a new page on @OurWorldInData to help Americans visualize state-by-state progress. These charts, all based on data published by the @CDCgov, will be updated daily. ourworldindata.org/us-states-vacc…
This set of 11 metrics includes:
• Doses administered (total and daily)
• Doses distributed and % used so far
• People who received at least 1 dose
• People fully vaccinated
They can be explored as bar charts (latest data) or line charts (over time) & absolute or per capita.
On the page, all our graphs are displayed by default as line charts—but you can turn them into bar charts simply by dragging the time slider at the bottom to the most recent date. Here is an example, with the total number of doses administered per 100 people in the population.
Turkey is starting its mass vaccination campaign today. Not only has it launched a full website for it (covid19asi.saglik.gov.tr) but there's also a vaccination tracker that seems to be reporting vaccinations in real time (it goes up every minute or so if you refresh the page).
According to this article, "Each individual will be assigned vaccine doses by name with a barcode". This could explain how they're able to pull this off. aa.com.tr/en/turkey/turk…
We're starting to see more and better reporting on why some countries are able to vaccinate so quickly, and why others are lagging behind. I'll compile them in this thread in the future.
.@BelleTimsit analyzes what's helping Israel, Bahrain, and the UAE: universal healthcare, early approval, digitalization of health care, population attitude ("a mood evocative of wartime"), example set by political & religious leaders including minorities. qz.com/1953007/the-co…
.@NaomiOhReally focuses on Denmark (important as people in the EU may see it as more comparable): digital & centralized system, use of the "6th dose" technique, but more importantly the decision to go all-in on first doses (instead of reserving 2nd doses). irishtimes.com/news/world/eur…