The fifth and final sets of winners of the Massachusetts VaxMillions Giveaway will be announced on Thursday. All of them were lucky to win, but it turns out one is extremely lucky.
One of the first eight winners of the lottery wasn't actually the first to be drawn for the prize they won, a Baker administration official confirmed to NBC10 Boston Wednesday. The initial winner never claimed the prize, which ended up going to the second person whose name was drawn.
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The way the VaxMillions drawings have worked is that winners of the two prizes, $1 million to a fully vaccinated adult and a $300,000 college scholarship to fully vaccinated children between 12 and 17 years old, were drawn on each of the last five Mondays, with announcements coming three days later.
The state contacted the winners by phone and email, and they had 24 hours to respond before another person's name would be drawn.
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Now it's confirmed that happened in one case. The administration official didn't say which winner was drawn second, only that it wasn't in the final round.
It's unclear whether the person who initially missed out had won the $1 million or the college scholarship, or if they later realized they'd missed their chance to claim the prize.
By the way, this also means that everyone who registered for the VaxMillions Giveaway who hasn't yet been contacted by the state of Massachusetts about winning can be sure that they didn't win. The last winners' names will be revealed Thursday.
The odds of winning were very low — officials have said that 2.3 million adults and over 166,000 Massachusetts residents between the ages of 12 and 17 signed up for the giveaway.
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Here is a list of the winners from the first four drawings:
- Drawing 1: $1M prize Darrell Washington, of Weymouth; $300,000 scholarship Daniela Maldonado, of Chelsea
- Drawing 2: $1M prize Donna McNulty, of Billerica; $300,000 scholarship Dylan Barron, of Norwood
- Drawing 3: $1M prize Leo Costinos, of Attleboro; $300,000 scholarship Lilla Eliet, of Reading
- Drawing 4: $1M prize Lilly Guttenplan of Lowell; $300,000 scholarship Nadia Dutton of Rockland
