BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (KERO) — Dignity Health officials held a weekly press briefing Wednesday morning and announced the number of hospitalizations and patients in the ICU with COVID dipped slightly, but still remains a concern.

Despite the fact that Kern County's vaccination rate is just over 50% local officials don't think it will result in more severe mandates.

"I think if they were going to they would have. Everybody made up their mind, that either gonna get vax or not. Not sure instituting measures to stop the spread is going to be happening at this point going forward," said Bruce Peters, CEO and president of Mercy Hospital.

The latest numbers posted to the Kern County COVID dashboard showed another 477 positive test results with five new deaths attributed to the virus. The number of delta variant cases up to 531 from 507.