Two Nebraska legislators are arguing the state needs to get back to business as usual and restart the economy in the face of the coronavirus pandemic. But the idea is getting pushback.

Sens. Steve Halloran of Hastings and Steve Erdman of Bayard wrote an opinion piece for the Hastings Tribune and several other newspapers across the state, arguing against measures that shut down the economy. They say isolating the most at-risk individuals, banning large gatherings and targeting hotspots earlier could have been more effective.

In the meantime, they say, letting most people go about business as usual would expose them to the virus and build up what’s called herd immunity. Halloran described the idea.

“What we're talking about is having a significant percentage of the population deal with coming down with a virus such as coronavirus, and letting their antibodies build and be able to survive through it, which if you look at the statistics for Coronavirus nationwide, the survival rate is very high. We're focusing way too much on the number of people who have gotten it but not enough on those that recovered from it,” Halloran said.

Halloran said he’s hearing from lots of small business owners who say they’re not sure they’ll be able to survive economically.

“I'd like to see the governor lift some of the requirements… of businesses not being able to have groups of 10 or more in their business. I think that would be a smart thing to do,” he said.” Asked if that meant bars and restaurants should be allowed to reopen, Halloran said “Yep, absolutely.”

Sen. Adam Morfeld of Lincoln said the approach advocated by Halloran and Erdman is the wrong way to go.

“Even younger, middle-aged to younger healthy people can have severe complications with this disease. And so if we just open up the bars and the restaurants and let everybody go and mingle, what we're going to see is a surge in cases that will go to the hospital, the lack of ventilators, even for those that are younger, middle aged or healthy,” Morfeld said.

Gov. Pete Ricketts said herd immunity will build up, but it’s a matter of timing. “Yeah, people will be exposed to this over time. What we’re trying to do is make sure we slow that down, so that we don’t overwhelm the health care system, Ricketts said.

The governor added his administration will consider loosening some restrictions depending on the data as the expiration dates on health care orders begin to occur at the end of the month.

Morfeld, who runs the youth leadership organization Civic Nebraska says he understands the desire to restart the economy.

“There's nobody that wants to see you reopening the economy more than me…but not at the expense of people’s lives,” he said, noting he’d had to lay off about a third of his staff because of COVID-19.

Halloran says he’d like to see the Legislature itself reopen.

“If it would have been put to a vote whether or not the Legislature should stay in session through this, I would have voted to have it stay in session,” he said.

The Legislature has been in recess since March 12, except for three days when lawmakers reconvened to approve emergency spending to fight the coronavirus. Halloran missed those days, but said that was because his wife was in the hospital for an unrelated condition.

Morfeld said he doesn’t think it would be smart for senators to start meeting again in the Capitol.

“I don't think that Nebraskans want 49 people who live all across the state to come convene in the state's largest open concept office and then go back to their communities on the weekends and infect their communities,” he said.

Speaker of the Legislature Jim Scheer, who called the recess, said he still thinks it’s too early to call senators back, and doesn’t want to put their health at risk.