Giving people money to get vaccinated is 'patriotic': West Virginia governor
After saying that West Virginia had “hit a wall” when it comes to COVID-19 vaccinations, Gov. Jim Justice found a creative way to entice people to get the shot: offering $100 U.S. savings bonds for anyone age 16 to age 35. Justice is using money his state received from the federal government’s pandemic relief fund to offer the savings bonds, which would be paid retroactively to young people who have already received the shot.
Justice told Yahoo Finance Live the offer of the savings bonds was a “patriotic move” and something he said West Virginia needs to do to get 70% of the state fully vaccinated. So far, the governor said 42% of the state's population has been fully vaccinated and 53% has been given a first dose.
He said the incentive made good fiscal sense since it would cost roughly $27.5 million to offer the savings bonds versus the $75 million West Virginia has spent in just the last year testing and re-testing people for COVID-19.
Justice told Yahoo Finance that the setback in the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine also contributed to the slowdown in vaccinations. Production of that vaccine was temporarily halted after a small number of people who received the vaccine had blot clots. Last week, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) ruled that the benefits of the J&J vaccine outweighed the risks and allowed the vaccine to continue to be administered.
There are 144,894,586 Americans (43.6%) who have received at least one dose of the vaccine and 101,407,318 (30.5%) who are fully vaccinated as of April 29, according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
Justice is a long time supporter of former President Donald Trump, and said “it would be hard” for him not to support Trump if he ran again in 2024, but added that it was also important for the country to "get behind" President Biden. Biden had set a goal of administering 200 million COVID-19 vaccines in his first 100 days in office — one that the president has achieved.
Alexis Christoforous is an anchor at Yahoo Finance. Follow her on Twitter @AlexisTVNews.