The Hunter will need to live a charmed life to escape lockdown before Sydney.
The NSW government announced on Friday that all students still in locked down areas would return to school between October 25 and November 8.
Regional schools can open sooner if their districts are removed from lockdown, but that is looking increasingly unlikely in the Hunter.
Deputy Premier John Barilaro confirmed on Friday that regions such as the Hunter would need to be virus-free for at least 14 days to be freed from stay-at-home orders.
The Hunter registered two new cases on Friday, and Mr Barilaro said he was aware of more cases in the area since the last reporting period ended at 8pm on Thursday.
Regional NSW is in lockdown until midnight on Friday, September 10.
To open up on that date, the Hunter would need to have zero cases, along with no virus detections in its sewage, every day until then.
"It only takes one case and we lock you down," Mr Barilaro said in relation to regional areas.
The number of advertised exposure sites in the Lower Hunter has dwindled considerably in the past week, but the Boolaroo Costco cluster and a concerning infection at a Windale apartment block on Wednesday both involved travel to and from Sydney.
The two new Hunter cases include a Tomago man who was in Sydney for his entire infectious period and a woman from Kurri Kurri who was in the community for her entire infectious period.
"Unfortunately, the second case, a younger lady in the Kurri Kurri area, was active in the community while infectious," Hunter New England public health controller Dr Durrheim said.
"The source of her infection is not yet established, and we're doing a lot to understand where this might have been.
"We're worried that people in the Kurri Kurri and Maitland area may have been exposed to the virus."
Teachers will need to be fully vaccinated from November 8 as a condition of employment, joining health and aged care staff facing mandatory vaccination.
The government insisted on Friday that "ample opportunities" exist for people throughout NSW to access vaccinations, but it is clear limited Pfizer supplies are slowing the Hunter rollout.
NSW recorded 882 cases on Friday. The state has 767 COVID-19 patients in hospital, 117 in intensive care and 47 on ventilators.
Former World Health Organisation epidemiologist Professor Adrian Esterman said the virus transmission rate in NSW, calculated using a five-day moving average, had fallen from 1.18 to 1.13, the fifth drop in a row.
"It could be we are starting to see the increase in infections slowing down, which is good news," he wrote on Twitter.
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