NYC’s Caribbean American Zip Codes Show Lowest Vaccination Rates

By NAN Staff Writer

News Americas, NEW YORK, NY, Fri. Sept. 3, 2021: Last April, the number of Caribbean immigrants in New York City dying from the dreaded coronavirus was growing in zip codes in neighborhoods in southeast Queens, Brooklyn and the Bronx where Caribbean Americans lived, News Americas found. Now these are the same zip codes where vaccination rates are lagging behind, a NAN analysis of the city’s vaccine rate data has found.

Citywide, 65% of all New Yorkers have received at least one dose of the vaccine, according to the city. But in sizable Caribbean-American communities, vaccine rates broken down by zip code are as low as 46%.

Zips codes 11411 and 11429 in Queens, NY, which includes areas like Cambria Heights and Queens Village, are largely enclaves of foreign-born Caribbean immigrants, the vaccination rates respectively are 48.5 and 45.8 percent.

Both zip codes are home primarily to middle-class Jamaicans, Haitians, Grenadians and Guyanese, a News Americas analysis of City Data showed with a smattering of other West Indians including Dominicans, Barbadians and Trinidad and Tobagonians. Most have a college degree, are naturalized US citizens, own their own homes and earn a medium income of $47,370.

In Brooklyn’s Caribbean American areas, it was also very low. In Zip codes 11233 and 11219, both home to throes of West Indian immigrants, the vaccination rates were 43.2 and 44.6 percent, respectively, among the lowest in Brooklyn and in the City.

In Zip code 11236, which includes areas like east Flatbush, Canarsie and Flatlands, the majority of the population are Haitians, Jamaicans and Grenadians as well with a smaller percentage of Vincentians, Guyanese, Bahamians and Trinis, the city data shows the vaccination rate is 46.8 percent. In Zip code 11203, also home to many West Indian immigrants such as Guyanese, Haitians, Jamaicans, St. Lucians, Trinidadians, Grenadians, Vincentians, Bajans, and Dominicans, the vaccination rate was slightly better but still below citywide average at 52.5 percent.

In Bronx zip codes like 10465 where the foreign-born population is largely Dominican with a sliver of Jamaicans and Haitians the rates are a bit better, but still lower than the city average, at 58.4 percent.