More than 15 months after he declared a state of emergency in Nebraska, Governor Pete Ricketts says it will end Wednesday at midnight. Ricketts says new case numbers remain low and COVID-related hospitalizations make up less than 1% of the state’s hospital capacity. But he said Monday at a press briefing that despite the progress, the coronavirus isn’t going anywhere.
“This is going to be around with us forever folks,” Ricketts said. “That’s why it’s a great idea to get vaccinated. Vaccines work, we know that here in Nebraska. We also know that we’ve got to get back to a normal life and we’ve got to keep the risk in balance.”
Ricketts also announced the end of the Test Nebraska program that was put in place last year at the start of the pandemic. The program will end July 31st.
“We have tested 772,000 Nebraskans through the program. At one point, Test Nebraska made up more than half of all the tests that were going on here in the state, but with the addition of that other testing capacity that is out there and the few cases that we have, we are going to be ending the Test Nebraska contract on July 31st,” he said.
The last day to get a test through the program will be July 18th. Ricketts also said his expectations are Nebraska schools will be in-person this fall with no mask or vaccine requirements.