COVID-19 cases are rising. Local Waco hospital beds are filling up. The Waco area has reached its capacity in morgues. Mayor Dillon Meek begged Wacoans to get vaccinated at a press conference on Wednesday.

“It was also important not just to preserve the history and remind us of what this building means to this campus, and really what it represents about our mission, but also to make it a facility that really meets the needs of our faculty and staff and students today in terms of the dramatic changes we’ve seen in the way we teach and learn and do research on our campus,” Livingstone said during the rededication.

As COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations rise in McLennan County, student vaccination rates at Baylor are increasing daily.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that the infection rate among unvaccinated individuals is five times the infection rate among fully-vaccinated individuals.