COVID-19 Hotel Quarantine Workers

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN (15:22): My question is to the Minister for Health and Wellbeing regarding COVID-19.

The Hon. I.K. Hunter: The hapless minister.

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN: The hapless minister, indeed.

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN: In view of past comments by the Chief Public Health Officer about hotel quarantine staff that, 'We can't test people on a daily basis,' can the minister assure the chamber that there are enough test kits, equipment and staff for daily testing of all hotel quarantine staff, as per the national standard agreed by national cabinet?

The Hon. S.G. WADE (Minister for Health and Wellbeing) (15:23): I find this really offensive. I cop it sweet, as a politician, getting repeatedly misquoted by Labor out of context, but if you are going to walk into this chamber and take a quote from the Chief Public Health Officer, Nicola Spurrier, and say that because she said some months ago that we didn't have the capacity to test, that that somehow applies now.

The fact of the matter is that SA Health, just as Tom Dodd and his team ramped up the PCR testing in record time at the beginning of last year, are this year ramping up saliva testing. That is the opportunity the national cabinet has encouraged us to take up and that is exactly what we are doing. I'm not going to take any more mockery of Nicola Spurrier and Tom Dodd.

The PRESIDENT: The Hon. Ms Scriven has a supplementary.