Accepting responsibility for our own hygiene, our own health standards and for our own safe social distancing should be front and centre in all our thinking.

After almost two weeks of strong messaging and constant media coverage, it should also be getting easier to do.

In the midst of all the doom, there's signs of hope.

The number of cases reportedly nationally jumped from 2,252 to 2,793 overnight Wednesday, an increase of 541, but authorities have also pointed out this is evidence of the success of the coronavirus testing program.

Australia is conducting more tests per capita than anywhere else in the world and can now test up to 10,000 people a day.

The more the authorities test, the more cases they find, meaning cases are being detected early.

The current strike rate now stands at 1.5 per cent, up from .5 per cent last week.

The majority of new cases are still being found among overseas returnees, or those who have come into contact with them, and most are quite mild.

Of the 2,252 known cases on Wednesday, only 197 had been hospitalised due to their illness.

This has kept Australia's mortality rate low by global standards, but it also highlights the extreme vulnerability of older Australians.

Unless people adhere to the social distancing guidelines and stay at home as much as possible, older Australians who we all know and love, remain at greater risk.

While this is a scary time, with the number of global cases expected to reach more than 500,000 people today, there is still cause to hope Australia will weather the crisis in better shape than many.

What happens next is up to all of us.

Quite simply, the future depends very much on every single one of us doing the right thing for the good of everyone else.