How the Southern Tier stacks up on COVID vaccinations

The Southern Tier counties vary widely in their COVID vaccination rates.

At the top is Tompkins County, which has had 43.2 percent of its residents receive at least one vaccine dose, according to data from the state’s COVID-19 Vaccine Tracker as of Sunday at 11 a.m. That’s the second-highest vaccination rate among all New York state counties, behind only sparsely populated Hamilton County in the Adirondacks (59 percent).

At the bottom is Tioga County, where 24.9 percent of residents have received at least one dose of a COVID vaccine, according to the Sunday state data. That ranks third-lowest in the state, only higher than Bronx and Orleans counties.

In between are the Southern Tier counties of Broome (36.4%), Schuyler (33.8%), Chemung (30.4%), Chenango (30.3%), Delaware (27.9%), and Steuben (27.1%).

Statewide, 33 percent of New Yorkers have received at least one dose of a vaccine, according to the state vaccine tracker. So, three Southern Tier counties have so far vaccinated a higher proportion of their populations than the state average, while five Southern Tier counties are below the state average.

The Southern Tier region is currently experiencing low rates of COVID infections. The region’s seven-day average percentage of positive test results reported over the most-recent three days, for which data is available, ranged from just 0.77 percent to 0.80 percent, per state data issued on Sunday. That’s the lowest infection rate among all New York regions. The statewide positive rate is averaging just under 3.6 percent.