Winners of Manitoba's 2nd COVID-19 vaccine lottery draw announced

The second-round winners in Manitoba's Vax to Win lottery, sharing incash and scholarship prizes totalling $950,000, were announced Tuesday morning

Seven adults three fromthe Winnipeg health region and one each from the province's other health regions each won$100,000.

Ten youth, age12 to 17, each get a scholarship worth $25,000.

While there are a lucky few to be rewarded with cash, the province overall is the winner, saidManny Atwal, CEO ofManitoba Liquor and Lotteries.

"I want to thank everybody who's participated in the vaccination process overall," he said at a news conference on Tuesday.

"Everybody's helped protect Manitobans."

The lottery and its total of $1.9 million in cash and scholarships was first announced in Juneto encourage people to their COVID-19 shots.

At that time, 67.8 per cent of eligible Manitobans had received a first dose and 14.2 per cent had twodoses.

As of Tuesday, the province has 85.2 per cent of eligible people with a first dose and 81.1 per cent with both doses.

The cash prize winners from Tuesday's draw are:

• Cuba Bazimya, Winnipeg Regional Health Authority.
• Inderjit Virdi, WRHA.
• Michaelle Cruz, WRHA.
• Gertie Bruce, Interlake-Eastern Regional Health Authority.
• Edward Queskekapow, Northern Regional Health Authority.
• James Hopfner, Prairie Mountain Health.
• Russell Peters, Southern Health.

The youth scholarship winners are:

• Tristan Plourde.
• Levi Alexander.
• Christian Anthony Dizon.
• Theo Friesen.
• Ellen Clark.
• Drew Hall.
• Aubrey Trenholm.
• Oluwademilade (Demmy) Oni.
• Sara Dixon.
• Paul Concha.

The scholarships "reflect the difference you are making in our province today," Wayne Ewasko, Manitoba's advanced education, skills and immigration minister, told the students.

"You have helped to save lives and that's no small feat for people of any age."

To qualify for the lotto draw, people had to gettheir second vaccine dose by Sept. 6. Everyone 12 and older who did sowas automatically eligible to win, unless they opted out.

The first draw for the exact same set of prizestook place in early August, with the province introducing the winners at two events later that month.

People had to gettheir first dose by Aug. 2 in order to be entered for that one.

The youth scholarships can be used to attend any post-secondary institution in the world. If the winner doesn't plan to goto university or college right away, the money will be put into a trust that they can access to pay for post-secondary educationuntil they are 20.

After that, the money will be considered forfeited.