A typo, a calculator problem or a correct estimate? How to explain that the government has posted a vaccination rate against Covid-19 of 103.43% in Paris among adults? The figure has been online on the government website since an update dated October 14.
A reader questioned us about this surprising statistic, which is relayed on Facebook and even on TikTok, feeding accusations of “rigging”.
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This digit comes well from the government site. A rate higher than 100% is possible in Ile-de-France, warns the government, because “the inhabitants tend to be vaccinated outside their place of residence”. A suburban resident working in the capital can choose to be vaccinated near their place of work. His vaccination will then be counted for Paris.
This is what counts here: to calculate the vaccination rate, the government takes the number of adults vaccinated in the vaccination centers of the department and then “relates it to the number of adult inhabitants of the selected place”. If more people come to Paris to be vaccinated than there are inhabitants, then we get such a rate.
Where does this figure come from? Contacted by 20 minutes, the Prime Minister’s services, which host this site, referred us to the Ministry of Health, which did not respond to our requests.
Close to Public Health France estimates
It is close to the estimates of Public Health France, which gives immunization coverage 99% in Paris for people aged twelve and over, based on the place of vaccination.
A new calculation, updated on October 18 and available on the government database, given 90.4% immunization coverage in Paris, this time for the entire population. This estimate is always based on the place of vaccination.
How to get an overview of the vaccination rate of the Parisian population? As spotted it LCI, Health Insurance makes different calculations and relies on the department of residence to calculate the number of people vaccinated against Covid-19. As of October 10, she estimated that 77% of Parisians were fully vaccinated, all age groups combined.
This figure, however, is not a real-time snapshot of the vaccination. To achieve this percentage, the Health Insurance relies on population figures provided by INSEE which date from January 1, 2020, a little over a year and a half ago. This figure therefore does not take into account departures and arrivals in the capital since this period.