The acting medical officer of health for Windsor-Essex is once again pleading with the community to get a COVID-19 vaccine.
Dr. Shanker Nesathurai made the plea Thursday morning as more restrictions in Windsor-Essex and across the province get lifted.
He says there still remains about 50,000 eligible residents in the area who remain unvaccinated.
"I think a fair characterization is not only are we asking and recommending but pleading with those people," he continued. "Most of the deaths or the disproportion number of deaths are people who are unvaccinated, many of those deaths are senseless."
He says he does recognize many of the 50,000 individuals have heard the messages but have elected to decline the recommendation.
"We always remain hopeful and always optimistic and I hope for those individuals who have yet not got vaccinated to get vaccinated to help themselves but also to help their family and their children," he said.
Dr. Nesathurai believes the region has a long way to go, to get to the best level of community protection.
"It's particularly important as we move towards a period of greater relaxation of the public health measures, to get that vaccination rate to a rate that's higher than the current rate," says Dr. Nesathurai.
Windsor-Essex has an overall COVID-19 fully vaccinated coverage rate of 78.4 per cent.
The health unit says the 5-11 age group has the lowest coverage rate for two vaccines with 21.1 per cent followed by those in the 18-24 age group with 76.4 per cent and the 12-17 age group with 78.6 per cent.