Closing every school in Victoria to help prevent the spread of coronavirus could currently do more harm than good, Premier Daniel Andrews has stressed.
Another 23 cases of COVID-19 have been recorded in Victoria overnight, taking the state's total number of positive tests to 94.
Toorak Primary School in Melbourne's inner southeast has closed for at least 24 hours from Tuesday after a teacher was confirmed as being infected.
Schools in general have not been told to close, but some private schools - including Ballarat Grammar, Carey Baptist Grammar School, Loreto Mandeville Hall, St Kevin's and Yeshiva-Beth Rivkah College - have decided to shut their gates regardless.
Victorian Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton says the decision not to close schools was based on how the disease presented in children, and to avoid busy health and emergency workers being forced to look after their children.
It comes as non-essential mass gatherings of more than 500 people have been banned.
Mr Andrews insists it's the right call.
"I know many, many parents are anxious, they're concerned, and I know to a certain extent it's a bit counterintuitive that schools remain open," he told reporters on Tuesday.
"But the advice is, closing schools now - that's not to say they won't close at some stage in the future - but if we were to close them now, across the board, that could make a very difficult set of circumstances even worse.
"It could do more harm than good."
Victorian Education Minister James Merlino said the advice is that it is best to close schools closer to the peak of the infection.
Patients line up at the Royal Melbourne Hospital for Coronavirus testing. Tuesday, 10 March, 2020. Source: AAP
If government schools are closed down, teachers will continue to be paid and will keep working on their laptops, he said.
The City of Melbourne is looking at how to increase support for the elderly and homeless.
Mayor Sally Capp said the council is making sure it has access to hundreds of meals to deliver to the elderly, if organisations usually involved in such deliveries are shut down, and premises to accommodate rough sleepers are being examined.
Some of Victoria's biggest universities are moving classes online after a state of emergency was declared in Victoria to deal with the spread of COVID-19.
From Tuesday, La Trobe, Monash and Swinburne universities have suspended all classes until the end of the week so staff can prepare for online learning.
The state of emergency was declared to enforce the national 14-day isolation sanctions on all travellers coming into Australia, announced by Prime Minister Scott Morrison at the weekend.
Anyone returning from overseas will have to self-isolate or risk fines of up to $20,000, while police officers will have the power to can detain people, restrict movement and prevent entry to premises.
Victorian Transport Infrastructure Minister Jacinta Allan said there is no advice that the construction of major infrastructure projects in the state will be affected by the restriction on mass gatherings, but stressed that advice could change.
