COVID-19 Vaccination Program in China: a Subnational Descriptive Analysis on Target Population Size and Current Progress

Abstract

\n Introduction: China is facing substantial risks of imported COVID-19 cases and a domestic resurgence in the long run, and COVID-19 vaccination is expected to be the long-lasting solution to end the pandemic. We aim to estimate the size of the target population for COVID-19 vaccination at the provincial level and summarize the current progress of vaccination programs, which could support local governments in the timely determination and adjustment of vaccination policies and promotional measures.Methods: By extracting provincial-stratified data from publicly available sources, we estimated the size of priority target groups for vaccination programs and further characterized the ongoing COVID-19 vaccination program at the provincial level, including the total doses administered, the coverage rate, and the vaccination capacity needed to achieve the target coverage of 70%.Results: The size of the target population shows large differences among provinces, ranging from 3.5 million to 115.2 million. As of June 10, the speed of vaccine roll-out differs remarkably as well, with the highest coverage occurring in Beijing and Shanghai, where 69.8% and 62.3% of the population is fully vaccinated, respectively. However, in 19 of 31 provinces, less than 40% of the population was administered at least one dose, in 9 of which the proportion was even less than 30%. Compared to the routine vaccination capacity before the COVID-19 pandemic, the COVID-19 vaccination capacity has greatly improved. Nevertheless, the current vaccination capacity is far lower than the target of 70% coverage by the end of 2021 or by mid-2022 in approximately 5%-20% of provinces, particularly the Guizhou, Yunnan, Xinjiang, Fujian and Hebei provinces.Conclusions: Large disparities exist in the target population size and vaccination progress across provinces in China. Vaccine coverage is far from meeting the herd immunity threshold, and the vaccination service capacity needs to be further improved.