The U.S. state of West Virginia is encouraging its residents to go and get vaccinated against Covid-19 by offering an extra incentive.

Governor Jim Justice, a Republican, announced on April. 27 (Singapore time) that all West Virginians aged 16 to 35 will receive a US$100 savings bond (~S$130) if they get a Covid-19 vaccine.

The bond will also be available to anyone within the age group who already has received the vaccine. The recipient of the bond can retrieve the US$100, plus interest, at a later date.

The New York Times reported that Justice said that residents were "not taking the vaccines as fast as we’d like them to take them."

The age group covers around 380,000 people. According to Github's Covid-19 data, West Virginia has given out around 1.14 million doses, with 519,000 people fully vaccinated. That represents about 29 per cent of the state's population.

Justice will use funds from the U.S. federal government's CARES act, passed in 2020 under President Donald Trump, to pay for this endeavour.

He added that West Virginia is trying to contain the spread of the virus by stopping it "dead in its tracks", and said if that happens, "these masks go away, the hospitalisations go away, the death toll and the body bags start to absolutely become minimal."