GPs have expressed concern that some people with coronavirus symptoms are waiting up to a week before contacting their doctor.
Dr Ray Walley, member of the GP Expert Advisory Group on COVID-19, says there are concerns that complacency about the virus is setting in among some people.
It comes after 174 new cases of COVID-19 were confirmed in the country yesterday.
110 of those cases were in Co Kildare, one of the three counties where regional restrictions are in place for two weeks.
Dr Walley told Newstalk Breakfast with Susan Keogh that he believes the local lockdown was "definitely" the right thing to do.
He said: "They have the granular detail of local numbers... the local rate of spread is so high they were increasingly concerned.
"I one hundred percent support the measures they put in place."
Additional testing centres have been set up in the affected areas, and Dr Walley said there are a number of reasons why local testing is important.
He explained: "People who are suspected COVID... you don't want them travelling very far. If, for example, they are unable to travel, we want local units to be able to get to them.
"You're also potentially talking about sick people, so you do want local access to testing. But the relevance of testing is for contact tracing - it doesn't change the management of the patient."
Complacency
The Dublin GP suggested there is an "element of complacency out there".
He said: "GPs nationally have been, for the last three or four weeks, expressing concern that people have been presenting six or seven days into symptoms.
"The difficulty is if you're into six or seven days into symptoms, are you isolating? It might be that people are staying in their house, but they could be infecting their household.
"In the last week, I saw two people who were considerably sick and were referred to hospital - it isn't something that is unique to older people.
"If you have any of the symptomatology - breathlessness, cough, lost of taste, lost of smell, fever which might just manifest as hot and cold shivers - you need to immediately isolate and contact your GP."
He said a COVID-19 test not detecting the virus does not mean the person doesn't have it - and that if someone still has the symptoms they'll need to talk with their GP about what to do.
He explained: "The problem with this disease is you can have it, and the test doesn't pick it up. The test is approximately 85% sensitive.
"The test doesn't necessarily pick you up at the time that you got it - so it's important we realise it goes according to clinical symptoms."
