Jersey City Struggles With Racial Disparity In Vaccinations

JERSEY CITY, NJ — Jersey City is seeing a racial disparity when it comes to COVID-19 vaccinations, according to data released by the city.

Jersey City has administered 184,606 vaccines, as of May 3. City data shows that residents who identified as Black and Latino were among the lowest percentage of the population to be vaccinated. People who self-identify as Black or African American make up 22 percent of the Jersey City population but only made up 10 percent of residents who were vaccinated. People who self-identify as Hispanic or Latino make up 28 percent of the population but only accounted for 17 percent of vaccinations.

Jersey City has about 18 vaccination sites throughout the city, including several mobile sites. The first site that the city rolled out was on Martin Luther King Drive in February and incorporated a ride-share program to help drive residents to and from the clinics. Walk-up and no-appointment-necessary clinics have been rolled out as well.

In an interview with Patch in April, Mayor Steven Fulop talked about the vaccination effort in Jersey City and the complexities that come with it.

"One of the things about Jersey City being such a diverse city, it also means that we have a lot of harder to reach communities," Fulop said, "So we’re doing our best to outreach, the mobile site is set up and going into those communities to try and make sure that we’re getting the most number of people vaccinated."

Fulop touched on the fact that the temporary halt of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine didn't help the city in reinforcing trust in the vaccine.

"Trying our best with a lot of different ambassadors that different communities identify with in order to kind of make people feel more comfortable and see that this is a safe thing to do and a good thing to do to protect themselves, their family and the broader community," Fulop said, "It’s day-to-day work, it’s not something that’s gonna be a solution and people are gonna trust immediately."