OHIO — The chance to enter the first-round drawing of the state’s Vax-a-Million lottery this week came to a close Sunday night.
Officials will begin drawing names Monday around 7:30 p.m. for one of five $1 million prizes or full-ride scholarships, but the first winner won’t be announced until Wednesday so the state can verify the selected participants qualified for the lottery.
In order to have entered, participants must be an Ohio resident and received either the Johnson & Johnson vacccine or at the least the first dose of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine. Residents must have been 18 or older to enter the lottery for one of five $1 million prizes, and those who entered for full-ride scholarships had to be between 12- to 17-years-old.
If someone is found to not have gotten the vaccine but falsified the information in the drawing, the participant will be disqualified and another winner will be picked.
More than 1 million residents have entered the lottery since it was announced last week. Winners will be announced Wednesday at approximately 7:29 p.m. for the next five weeks, with the last winner being announced on June 23. Participants only had to enter their information once to be eligible for all five drawings.
Individuals can still register for a chance to win one of the next four prizes by clicking here or calling 1-833-4-ASK-ODH (1-833-427-5634).
The lottery is a public outreach campaign by the Ohio Department of Health to get residents vaccinated. State officials said Sunday the number of people in Ohio age 16 or older who received their initial COVID-19 vaccine jumped 33% within the first week of the lottery announcement.
Slightly more than 44% of Ohio’s population has received a first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, which is a 2% increase from a week ago, and 38% of the residents are completely vaccinated, according to state data.
