COVID-19 and hospitals: How serious is the situation at area facilities?
Our reporters dug into the data on the percentage of residents eligible for the coronavirus vaccine (5 years of age and older) who have gotten all shots in the initial series (two Pfizer doses, two Moderna doses or one Johnson & Johnson dose) by ZIP code.
Vaccination rates in ZIP codes containing universities may appear artificially low because students living there are listed as vaccinated by their home residence, not the university.
Use the map below to explore our findings.
Why Miami County isn’t in this story
The Miami County Health Department was unable to release data for this story because it could not get permission to do so from the Ohio Hospital Association. The Ohio Department of Health likewise would not release vaccination percentages by eligible population by ZIP code statewide.
The Ohio Department of Health on a daily basis reports ZIP-code level COVID-19 vaccination numbers to the Ohio Hospital Association. The hospital association analyzes those numbers and makes vaccination rates by ZIP code available to hospitals and local health departments. But OHA says the system it uses is proprietary, and state officials are not allowed to release this information to the public.
For this story, the Dayton Daily News used Ohio public records law to obtain the data from eight area county health departments. This data shows local disparities in protection against COVID-19 not reflected in countywide numbers released by the Ohio Department of Health.
