Question Time

COVID-19 Testing Clinics

Mr PICTON (Kaurna) (14:05): My question is to the Premier. Why have there again been very long wait times for testing 22 months since the first COVID case in South Australia? With your leave, sir, and that of the house, I will explain.

Leave granted.

Mr PICTON: Last week, as the Premier was opening the borders he said at a press conference:

So we've looked at all the things that need to be put in place in South Australia before we've taken a decision to remove those state borders, making sure we've got adequate SA Pathology capacity and also making sure that we've got overall testing capacity and availability right across the state.

Last night, there were again reports of lines of over 2½ hours for people coming forward to get tests at the Victoria Park site when seven exposure sites were listed.

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL (Dunstan—Premier) (14:05): I thank the member for Kaurna for his question. He is quite right: we have put additional resources into SA Pathology, and of course the private laboratories in South Australia have been also able to increase their capacity in preparation for us opening our borders on 23 November.

I think that our waiting times compare extraordinarily favourably with any other pathology service in the country—in fact, pretty much any other pathology service in the world. Ahead of opening, we moved both the Ridgehaven site and the Victoria Park site to 24 hours, seven days a week. We also looked at significantly flexing up the hours for many of our other sites, and we will continue to do that in accordance with the requirements.

I think that yesterday we processed around 8,600 specimens through SA Pathology. This is well below the full capacity that we have provided for, and we will continue to flex that up. Obviously, some of those sites were identified quite late in the night. We are now operating at a different level, and so I think people should feel very assured that if they go online, they use the app, they will be able to book in for a time for testing, but of this morning there were no lines whatsoever.

I know that this will be an anxious time for many people here in the state as we do open up our borders, but can I just reassure this house that we have done this in accordance with the advice that was received at the national cabinet from the Doherty Institute, which said that at the time that we get to 80 per cent of all of our 16 and over population fully vaccinated we put ourselves in a good position to be able to remove those state borders and end statewide lockouts. That is precisely what we are doing at the moment.

There were always inevitably going to be cases that come into South Australia. I think that to date we have had about 30 cases in the last nine days. This is well within the provisions of the model that was created. I think that we are well on track, and part of being well on track is making sure that we still have the confidence of people in South Australia to go and get vaccinated if they have not been vaccinated already, or to have that second jab, or to have that booster when they become eligible, to continue to use the QR code check-in, but also just to be mindful that we are now going into a different phase of this disease.

That really means that people need to be more aware than ever before about social distancing, hand hygiene, hand shakes and close contact. We are not at the same place we were three or four months ago, when a single case would have been something that we would try to eliminate as quickly as possible. We have moved from that elimination of community transmission through to a suppression of community transmission in South Australia.

Even though we don't have the same level of intense focus on every single case, we do still want to reduce the spread as much as possible so that we can continue to increase those vaccination rates in South Australia. The good news is now that we have, I think, 90 per cent—so nine out of every 10—of 12 year olds and older in South Australia have now had at least one shot of their vaccination, so I think that very soon we will get to that fully vaccinated 12 and over population of 90 per cent. That puts us in an extraordinarily good position but, yes, last night there were some short delays, and I think that was—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! The Premier has the call.

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL: I think that SA Pathology is providing world's best practice in terms of pathology service. Unlike those opposite, who want to have a go at them, what we are doing on this side is to make sure—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL: —that we are providing all the resources—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! The member for Kaurna is called to order. The member for Lee is called to order.

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL: —they need to continue to provide a world's best practice service supporting people in South Australia.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Playford is called to order. The member for Kaurna!