Hours after retiring, a frontline COVID nurse wins $200,000, Kentucky lottery says

A Kentucky nurse who worked on the front lines throughout the COVID-19 pandemic won the lottery the day she retired, lottery officials said.

The Floyd County woman, who was a nurse for 36 years, bought a scratch-off lottery ticket at a Double Kwik, Kentucky lottery officials said in a news release. After scratching off the $10 ticket at the Prestonsburg location, she saw she had matched the number 20 in the final row.

The woman, who wishes to remain anonymous, then scratched the prize amount underneath the number to reveal the ticket’s $200,000 prize.

“It was unbelievable,” she said in the release. “I had just retired that day. I saw this as a sign it was meant to be for me to quit working.”

”It’s been tough,” she said about her last two years on the job.

But now she has the cash in hand after she drove to Louisville to receive her check. She received $142,000 after taxes, the lottery said.

She’s reassured that she can retire. “I can do this,” she said about her career change.

This story was originally published November 10, 2021 at 5:49 PM with the headline "Hours after retiring, a frontline COVID nurse wins $200,000, Kentucky lottery says."

Mariah Rush

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Mariah Rush is a National Real-Time Reporter. She is a graduate of the University of Notre Dame and has previously worked for The Chicago Tribune, The Tampa Bay Times and The Philadelphia Inquirer.