Vaccination will be the region's best defence when it welcomes an influx of visitors for the Melbourne Cup long weekend and COVID-19 already seeding into holiday destinations outside Albury-Wodonga.
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Beechworth Health Centre had a worker test positive to coronavirus on Monday, forcing the facility into lockdown before reopening 24 hours later.
Albury Wodonga Health confirmed the person who tested positive didn't live in Indigo Shire, but mayor Jenny O'Connor said the growing Albury-Wodonga cluster had Beechworth and other towns opening the doors to tourists post the Melbourne lockdown on edge.
"I'm very concerned about seeing cases in Indigo Shire right at the time when we're opening up as a state and expecting a lot of visitors," she said.
"I'm very concerned about the testing facilities not being able to keep up with the demand.
"We've all been looking forward to seeing some recovery and visitation happening, but it's actually happening at a bad time for us because we are seeing this big outbreak on the border."
There are four active cases in Indigo Shire, seven in Towong and two in Alpine among 224 active cases in the Albury Wodonga Local Public Health Unit's catchment.
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The bulk are in Wodonga with 159 followed by Wangarata with 53.
"We have evidence now COVID-19 is seeding into the smaller communities sitting around Albury-Wodonga," AWH director Lucie Shanahan said.
"All these cases to date we've been able to link back to known, confirmed cases or the cluster we have.
"Through their quick work and diligence yesterday the health service is back up and running with absolutely no impact."
There will be no restriction on travel between regional Victoria and Melbourne when the state hits the 80 per cent double dosed milestone.
Ms Shanahan said vaccination would be the first line of defence in halting more cases.
"Our key message is for people to get vaccinated," she said.
"As we learn to get back to life everyday the best measure people can take is to get vaccinated.
"We've got over 1000 appointments available in our vaccination hub in Wodonga this week.
"What we're going to see as Victoria and NSW return to living in a COVID as normal world as we possibly can, we are going to see spikes of cases from time to time.
"If you are at all symptomatic come forward for a test."
Ms Shanahan confirmed there was a similar low figure of fully vaccinated children in Wodonga aged between 12 to 15 years compared to the 24 per cent in Albury reported on Monday.
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