TONIGHT'S looming closure of the boundaries around Melbourne and the Mitchell Shire shows how desperate the fight to gain control of the pandemic's spread has become.
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And it means we in Greater Bendigo have little choice but to make the best of what now appears a daunting, uncertain situation.
Just as the shut-down of the NSW-Victorian border has been occasionally talked about in the past couple of months, so too has locking down Melbourne, a reflection of where the heart of this crisis lies.
But many would not have thought it was going to happen.
Even allowing for a case detected in Greater Bendigo last week, our region's rate of COVID-19 infections has been negligible.
Even the rate of diagnoses in Sydney and Melbourne had not led to any expectation that the situation was about to test authorities up to and beyond their capabilities.
That was, though, until Victoria began its recent coronavirus-spike, with dozens-upon-dozens of new cases every day.
Many were linked with the apparent escape from poorly administered hotel quarantine in Melbourne, but even more concerning has been the growing rate of cases with unknown tracing.
Thankfully, Premier Daniel Andrews stopped short of locking the entire state down again, and while many regional communities would have been shocked at yesterday's announcement, they would also be relieved we have been spared the worst impacts of lockdown - so far.
So we continue to keep a lookout for friends, relatives and neighbours to see if they need any support, and hope that further relief measures will be announced sometime soon.
