OMAHA, Neb. (AP) - An Omaha police officer is among those who have tested positive for the new coronavirus in Nebraska, officials said Thursday.
A news release from the Omaha Police Department said the officer had recently traveled out of state on vacation and self-quarantined upon return. The officer, whose name hasn’t been released, has not returned to work since the trip, police said.
The officer was among four new cases reported Friday out of Douglas County, bringing the state’s total to 72.
News of the new cases came as Nebraska’s initial claims for unemployment benefits skyrocketed with the rest of the nation’s amid the coronavirus pandemic. The claims rose to nearly 16,000 last week from a little less than 800 the week before, according to a federal report released Thursday.
Nebraska’s number shattered the previous state record of 4,003 in a single week, state Labor Commissioner John Albin said at a news conference with Gov. Pete Ricketts. Albin said the hardest-hit workers were generally in the food service, health care, hospitality and retail industries. Food service workers alone counted for about 40% of the new filings.
The state already has waived many of its requirements to collect unemployment benefits, including a mandate that recipients make at least five attempts per week to get a new job.
Albin said state officials hope to fast-track new claims but first have to get the initial surge in applications. He said the agency has opened a new call center to handle the deluge of requests from laid-off employees and will “move heaven and earth” to help people, but he urged residents to apply online instead of over the phone because it’s faster.
He said “all is not dark,” given Nebraska’s relatively strong economy and low unemployment before the outbreak, and predicted that the state would rebound once businesses can operate as normal. Nebraska had a major worker shortage before the outbreak, with about 34,000 open jobs listed on the Nebraska Department of Labor’s website.
“You can argue about whether those are available today, but you’ve got to think that sometime in mid-April, early May, those jobs are going to start coming back,” Albin said.
Nationally, 3.3 million people in the U.S. filed unemployment claims in the week ending March 21, compared with 282,000 the week before.
“Nearly every state providing comments cited the COVID-19 virus impacts,” the U.S. Labor Department report said. “States continued to cite services industries broadly, particularly accommodation and food services.”
Earlier this week, public health workers announced that a health care worker is believed to be the source of an outbreak at a Blair assisted living facility. The worker is the third person tied to Carter Place to have tested positive for the virus, said Terra Uhing, executive director of the Three Rivers Public Health Department.
For most people, the coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough that clear up in two to three weeks. For some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness, including pneumonia, or death.
In other news, Nebraska Secretary of State Bob Evnen announced that election officials still plan to hold the state’s May 12 primary election as scheduled. Evnen said many counties have already sent early ballot request forms to voters to streamline the process and will open polling places with extra safety precautions. Evnen said he still expects good turnout.
“I don’t think Nebraskans are going to stay away from the polls or not vote because of a microbe,” he said.
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Schulte reported from Lincoln. Associated Press writer Nelson Lampe reported from Omaha. Follow Grant Schulte on Twitter: https://twitter.com/GrantSchulte . Follow Margery A. Beck on Twitter: https://twitter.com/margery3
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Follow the AP’s coverage of the pandemic at https://apnews.com/VirusOutbreak and https://apnews.com/UnderstandingtheOutbreak
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