It's changed the way people wash their hands and made people conscious of germs on communal items like supermarket trolleys and touch screens.

Sanitisers and disinfectant are used multiple times a day to keep any germs at bay.

Director for Pandemic Response with Albury Wodonga Health Sally Squire said the pandemic had changed people's hygiene practices.

"I think a lot of people have now got into the habit of washing their hands, using sanitiser, practicing social distancing," she said.

"I think that we'll continue to see come increased vigilance in a lot of the population over the next period of time."

Mrs Squire said after COVID-19 the public could demand shops maintain the strict disinfecting measures introduced during the pandemic.

"There may well be a lot changes, retailers may feel obliged to continue some of those [disinfecting] practices," she said.

"I think the public will probably want to see these things in place for a period of time."

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Mrs Squire, who was executive director of midwifery and nursing before being appointed director of pandemic response, said this had been an exceptional time of drastic change for the community, country and health profession.

She said COVID-19 had changed the way health organisations interacted with patients, technology and other health services.

AWH has made radical changes to its operations, embracing video conferencing and telehealth while setting up an Incident Response Team and mobile drive-through testing centre.

Elective surgery and dentistry has been limited, relationships with departments and rural health services strengthened and bed capacity increased to deal with any potential surges.

And with change comes innovation. Guest WiFi has been set up at the Wodonga Hospital campus and the service is piloting a 'virtual visiting service' to allow patients, especially those in palliative care and long-term admissions, to connect via video with family or friends.

Mrs Squire said the service was working on free WiFi for the Albury campus as well, and believes the video visiting may have long-term benefits by allowing patients to connect with family who live outside the area.

One of the biggest and most overwhelming changes that coronavirus has inspired was the wave of community appreciation directed towards healthcare and frontline workers.

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For Mrs Squire it has been incredible to see.

She said every single person that worked for the health services from the cleaners to the cooks and engineers was doing a remarkable job and it was pleasing to see the community acknowledged their hard work and sacrifices.

"No one can do this alone, we are an absolute team," Mrs Squire said.

"I think the recognition all the staff of the hospital have received and the thanks.... It's really buoyed the staff.

"Our staff have really stepped up to this challenges and I feel so proud."

Mrs Squire said right now, the service was focusing on increased testing and monitoring in the community to establish if community transmission was occurring.

At the same time AWH is beginning to analyse, reflect and review the measures taken in the past couple of months to establish what could be adopted full time, what can be improved and how the service might look in five or 10 years.