Bendigo Health reflects on the two years of Victoria's state of emergency

In that time, healthcare workers struggled along with the rest of the population to keep up with ever-changing advice and rulings.

But despite this, Greater Bendigo, central Victoria and the Loddon Mallee managed to top any challenge thrown their way.

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Bendigo Health chair Bob Cameron said having community compliance when it came to following the rules had been a real help during the pandemic.

"It's been such a big change in the community, but the response from them has been huge," he said.

"We've had a great uptake of vaccinations and most people have been following the health advice, so it's been good so far.

"But we're almost seeing life go back to normal now and that's a great thing, but we have to keep our eyes open and ensure we keep it that way."

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Despite the setbacks from each variant, a Code Brown and everything in between, Mr Cameron said Bendigo Health staff never gave up.

"Like a lot of other industries, our healthcare workers have seen their business disrupted time and time again over the past two years," he said.

"But even through all that, they've kept smiling and I think they should all be very proud of the work they have done and continue to do.

"The health system has had to adapt a lot over the past few years and I think Bendigo Health has done a great job of that.

"We have had some positives come out of this. Things like telehealth were on the cards for a long time, but when COVID hit, we needed to use that technology to keep our hospitals running."

As other states battle Omicron's subvariant, BA.2, Mr Cameron said it would only be a matter of time before Greater Bendigo would begin seeing cases of its own.

"We're probably a few weeks behind NSW with this new variant and we're already seeing what it's doing up there.

"But we're not seeing this new variant being any more severe than Omicron, however we are expecting more people to get it.

"The best thing people can do is to get vaccinated if they aren't already to try and protect themselves against severe illness.

"The one thing the vaccination does do well is protect people from becoming very sick.

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In the region, almost 99 per cent of people have had their second dose of the COVID-19 vaccine.

For third dose boosters, Mr Cameron said two thirds of the population had been vaccinated.

"We would like to see that improve, but we know it's a bit complicated," he said.

"Some people have had Omicron and decided not to worry about getting vaccinated, but we would encourage them to still come and get their booster.

"Similarly, there's about 1000 children in the area that are eligible for their second vaccination, but a lot of them would have already got COVID-19 and aren't worrying about coming back."

As the regions open up and welcome larger events in the coming months, Mr Cameron said the Easter period could see another increase in cases.\

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"We saw what the Omicron variant did over Christmas and how much it could spread," he said.

"While there weren't a lot of hospitalisations that came out of it at the time, but there were still a lot of people that were very sick.

"With Easter coming up with big events and big crowds, there is the same potential as well.

"So we would urge people to make sure they are vaccinated and make sure they are following COVIDsafe protocols at these events.

"We should be doing everything we can to ensure we are able to keep going about our business as we have been."

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