50 cases are linked to Australian Lamb Colac.

There were 786 people tested for COVID-19 in Colac on Monday.

There are 35 active cases in Greater Geelong, 10 in Ballarat, 11 in Bendigo, three in Surf Coast Shire, six in Golden Plains, seven in Horsham, six in Glenelg Shire, one in Southern Grampians Shire and one in Warrnambool.

Corangamite Shire is back to zero cases.

There have been a further six deaths and 384 new cases of coronavirus overnight in Victoria.

The drive through testing clinic at Colac Central Reserve is now open to the public.

The Neighbourhood House at 23 Miller Street, Colac is also open for COVID-19 testing.

Portland District Health chief executive Chris Giles has issued an urgent plea to residents with even the mildest symptoms to get tested after an eighth person returned a positive test in Glenelg Shire on Tuesday.

"I know it is hard being at home isolating after you have had a COVID-19 test, especially when the time from test to results is over five days and you are worried, using up sick leave or your feeling guilty about not being at work," she said.

"Imagine what is might feel like if your partner, friend, work colleague gets sick and tests positive to COVID-19, no link to existing case and as a close contact you have to be tested and are found to be the index case to a new outbreak.

"Is putting off testing when you have symptoms worth the risk for all the people you care about or associate with - for me personally its not.

"COVID-19 has no vaccine and no cure, anyone who gets this virus is at risk of life long complications, or even death, I want to stop this virus moving insidiously through our community, but if I can't find the people infected I can't slow and ultimately stop the spread."

She said tests cannot be run in the south-west and instead must be processed in Melbourne or Geelong.

"I am told each batch of tests takes about 4 hours to run, the result is then entered into the system and either emailed or sent directly into our patient record system," Ms Giles said.

"Every day PDH staff are checking results and sending either text messages for negative tests or phoning to confirm positive patients and talking about next steps.

"The Portland tests are included in the Melbourne and Geelong runs and unto 40,000 tests a day are currently being managed in priority order, more testing capacity is being added regularly but as capacity grows so currently is demand hence test turn around times grows.

"Please be patient and think about the benefits to those around you, as you have taken this seriously and got tested and are contributing the the health and well-being of our rural community."

READ MORE:

Our COVID-19 news articles relating to public health and safety are free for anyone to access. However, we depend on subscription revenue to support our journalism. If you are able, please subscribe here. If you are already a subscriber, thank you for your support.