While COVID-19 cases continue to trend downward, the lack of open beds and available staff have doctors in Northeast Kansas worried about the fall and winter seasons.

WIBW-TV reports the University of Kansas Health System hosted its COVID-19 update on Wednesday, with a panel of 13 chief medical officers and infectious disease doctors from around the state.

Dr. Steve Stites, Chief Medical Officer at the University of Kansas Health System, said COVID numbers were falling around the region which is a welcome sight with the new bivalent COVID-19 vaccines from Pfizer that could start shipping in as soon as a week.

Dr. Dana Hawkinson, Infectious Disease Expert at KU Med, said those shots are expected to be ready by the first or second week of September while the Moderna bivalent vaccine will come later in September. He also noted that monkeypox is on the rise in the U.S. with 15,909 cases - four of those in Kansas and 38 in Missouri.

Dr. Stites also boasted a new application from the Kansas Department of Health and Environment to help rural hospitals transfer COVID-19 patients to open beds in facilities better equipped to handle the virus.