COVID-19 vaccination rates vary dramatically by astrological sign, with Leos at the top of the list and Scorpios at the bottom, according to The Salt Lake Tribune.
The Salt Lake County Health Department calculated the rates based on anonymous birth dates from the county’s vaccination data and then compared those figures to national estimates for the overall population represented by each sign.
“Now that Mercury is not in retrograde, we’re just going to leave this here … (and yes, this is based on data),” the Health Department wrote in a Twitter post on Tuesday.
“The COVID-19 vaccine is backed by science and is no way influenced by horoscopes,” the department continued. “But come on Scorpios!”
According to the graphic, 70% of those with the Leo sign are fully vaccinated, followed by Aquarius at 67%, and Aries and Sagittarius both at 59%. The other signs range from 58% to 50%, in descending order: Cancer, Taurus, Gemini, Libra, Pisces, Capricorn, and Virgo. Scorpio sits at the bottom of the list, with 46% fully vaccinated.
Notably, three of the top four signs are elemental fire signs, The Salt Lake Tribune noted.
“We are overachievers,” Jeff Eason, an Aries and the department’s bureau manager of population health and informatics, who did the analysis, told the newspaper.
The Health Department’s post sparked positive and negative feedback across social media, with some musing about their own sign’s inclinations and others scoffing at astrology altogether.
“What we’re really doing is finding new and different ways to keep our community talking about vaccination when there is significant message fatigue around this topic,” the department wrote in the comments.
The range of vaccination rates was startlingly wide, Mr. Eason told The Salt Lake Tribune. But he noted that the difference “could all come down to denominators.”
Each sign’s vaccination rate was ranked almost exactly inverse to its share of the overall population, the newspaper reported. Scorpios and Virgos make up 9.4% and 9.3% of the U.S. population, respectively, as compared with 7.1% for Leos and 6.3% for Aquarians.
If the 12 astrological signs were more evenly distributed in Salt Lake County than nationally, Mr. Eason said, the range of vaccinations rates wouldn’t be as wide as the analysis shows.
“Obviously, it’s not super scientific because we are talking astrology,” Nicholas Rupp, a spokesman for the health department and a vaccinated Scorpio, told the newspaper.
Still, health department officials wanted to do the analysis as a fun way to start conversations and promote vaccinations. About 59% of Salt Lake County residents are fully vaccinated, and about 54% of Utah residents are fully vaccinated.
“We do have message fatigue around vaccines,” Mr. Rupp said.
A version of this article first appeared on WebMD.com.