DENVER — Colorado is trying a new incentive to get people to roll up their sleeves.
A $100 Walmart gift card seems to have done the trick for dozens who waited in line to get their coronavirus vaccines in an Aurora Walmart parking lot where a mobile vaccination site was set up Thursday.
Multiple other state-operated vaccine sites are also participating in the incentive. Anyone 12 years old and older are eligible.
For Denver resident Ron, the incentive was enough to get the shot.
"I'm happy I participated. I'm getting rewarded for it," Ron said.
For others, like Amber Egner, it was time to put aside some of her previous vaccine concerns.
"I’m not against vaccines. It’s just it was new, and I just wanted to wait, give it some time and see how it went," Egner said.
Egner got to collect two $100 Walmart gift cards Thursday, as she took her 12-year-old daughter to get vaccinated too.
The move is one that Medical Center of Aurora Emergency Physican Eric Hill encourages more people to make, as many of his recent covid patients expressed regret for not getting the vaccine.
"They all feel regret and wishing they had got it before it got too late," Hill said. "There was a lady last night that I sent home and she was okay to go home. Her and her family asked if they should get the Covid shot now, and I said ‘for you, you already have it. It’s too late.'"
The state's latest incentive will last until those Walmart gift cards run out.