Las Vegas, NV (KXNT) - A North Las Vegas kindergarten teacher was the first 250-thousand dollar Vax Nevada Days winner.
The cash and prizes initiative was started in an attempt to get more people vaccinated. Besides cash, prizes given away Thursday night included tuition and fishing licenses. 20 winners were announced during the first set of drawings.
Anyone in the state who’s been vaccinated is automatically registered. Drawings will be held every Thursday through August 26th.
There was a brief disturbance before the drawings started as a man with a megaphone interrupted the event, talking about what a scam the whole thing was. He was hauled off by security.
It's been hoped that "Vax Nevada Days" would help spur reluctant Nevadans to get their coronavirus vaccination, but the overall numbers in the state continue to lag behind the national average.
Nevada will have dozens of pop-up COVID-19 vaccination sites over the coming weeks with federal workers on hand to help reach out to the unvaccinated as the state confronts a jump in virus cases and hospitalizations.
Nevada has seen a 136% increase in hospitalizations of people with the coronavirus since May 31, the day before the state lifted most of its restrictions on businesses. Health officials said Thursday that the rate of hospitalizations has increased 62% over the last 14 days alone. Most of the cases involved people who were not vaccinated.