If you live in New York City and want to make $100 the easy way, you better act fast.
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio on Tuesday announced the city will drop a Benjamin on every resident who gets a COVID-19 booster shot.
“This will be by far the biggest booster incentive program in the United States of America,” de Blasio said. “This is the moment, come out in real big numbers, get those booster shots and help make your family safer and help make this whole city safer.”
But residents only have until the end of 2021 to cash in on the deal.
Cases of COVID-19, driven by the emergence of the Omicron variant, have soared in the city. On Friday, the city recorded more than 21,000 new COVID cases, setting a single-day record, according to Axios.
De Blasio also urged those who have not been jabbed to do so.
“Everyone who has not been vaccinated, it’s time. Everyone who has not gotten that booster, it’s time. This city is ready to make sure everyone gets that booster and that’s the way we move through these challenging few weeks,” de Blasio said Tuesday. “No more shutdowns. We’ve been through them, they were devastating, we can’t go through it again. We need to all work together these next few weeks.”
De Blasio’s incentive plan comes as a leaked British government report says that the Omicron variant is milder than the Delta variant.
The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA), which operates much like the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), found that those who contract Omicron are less likely to become severely ill compared to people who get the Delta variant, according to the data, which was obtained by Politico.
“More people are likely to have a mild illness with less serious symptoms — probably in part due to Britain’s large number of vaccinated and previously infected people, and possibly because Omicron may be intrinsically milder,” Politico reported. “Chief Medical Officer Chris Whitty has previously cautioned against too much optimism based on the initial optimistic signs from South Africa in the past few weeks. However, the UKHSA’s view after studying cases in Britain is that Omicron is indeed usually less severe than Delta.”
But the report included one caveat. “The less good news is that while Omicron seems milder overall, the UKHSA has found it is not necessarily mild enough to avoid large numbers of hospitalizations. The experts have found evidence that for those who do become severely ill, there is still a high chance of hospitalization and death.”
“The UKHSA has also confirmed that transmissibility of Omicron is very high, meaning that even though it is milder, infections could rocket to the point large numbers still end up in hospital — essentially negating the reduction in severity. NHS staff shortages due to widespread infections also have to be taken into account. Boris Johnson said on Tuesday that there was still ‘uncertainty’ on exactly how severe Omicron is, and how this impacts the hospitalization rate,” said the report.