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Legislative Council - Fifty-Fourth Parliament, Second Session (54-2)
2020-07-21 Daily Xml
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Coronavirus

The Hon. I. PNEVMATIKOS (15:08): My questions are to the Minister for Health and Wellbeing regarding COVID-19 testing clinics:

1. Why is there currently a wait of up to five, even six, hours at our metropolitan COVID-19 testing clinics?

2. Why is the Premier claiming that there are 60 sites for people to attend without a referral when the government's own website says that there are only 48 sites, of which only 10 are walk-ins with no appointments required?

3. Why are there only two drive-through clinics in the metropolitan area?

4. Why is GP referral required to these clinics?

5. Will the minister consider adding additional drive-through clinics in the metropolitan area and remove the GP referral requirement, allowing more people to get tested quickly and conveniently?

The Hon. S.G. WADE (Minister for Health and Wellbeing) (15:09): It is quite an extraordinary question and it's yet another example of the Labor Party wanting to be the driving force behind the public health response to COVID-19. One example why GP's referrals—

The Hon. C.M. Scriven interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. S.G. WADE: —are needed—

The Hon. C.M. Scriven interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. S.G. WADE: —is because SA Pathology and the public health team actually want people to have a GP who can follow up their test. We don't expect people to understand and be able to unpack their pathology test. We want to make sure that people have continuity of care. It was SA Pathology's clinical judgement that the best thing to do was to have GP referrals to metropolitan drive-through clinics.

In relation to the need for more mobile clinics, my understanding is that SA Health is currently in the process of putting on the road a fleet of 10 mobile testing clinics. My understanding was that the first assignment for the first of those mobile testing clinics was to Port Adelaide—metropolitan. I'm not going to say to the public health team and the SA Pathology team, who have been so innovative and so successful in the response to coronavirus, 'Wait! Stop! The Labor Party wants you to do it differently.' No, I'm going to continue to trust the expertise of the public health team that has delivered a world-class testing response. That was great—

The Hon. E.S. Bourke: You didn't trust them six months ago.

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. S.G. WADE: —to see assertive outreach surveillance going into—

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. S.G. WADE: —Port Adelaide—

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. I.K. Hunter: Why is your Premier misleading the parliament?

The PRESIDENT: Order, the Hon Mr Hunter!

The Hon. S.G. WADE: —going out to—

The Hon. I.K. Hunter interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: The Hon. Mr Hunter!

The Hon. S.G. WADE: —the community—

The Hon. I.K. Hunter interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: The Hon. Mr Hunter!

The Hon. S.G. WADE: —not expecting that everyone will come to them.

The Hon. I.K. Hunter: Why is your Premier misleading the parliament?

The PRESIDENT: Minister, sit down for a sec, please.

The Hon. I.K. Hunter: Answer the question you were asked.

The PRESIDENT: The Hon. Mr Hunter, please, let the minister answer the question.

The Hon. I.K. Hunter: He's not answering the question, sir.

The PRESIDENT: The Hon. Mr Hunter, I'm speaking and you don't! Enough! The Hon. Ms Pnevmatikos has asked a series of questions. The minister is doing his best to address those questions and he will be heard in silence. The Minister for Health and Wellbeing.

The Hon. S.G. WADE: Another aspect of the cluster of questions that came at me like a cluster of European wasps—

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. S.G. WADE: —was the issue of why are people needing to wait at clinics. Well, one of the reasons is because we have had a tremendous response from the South Australian community to the request—

The Hon. I.K. Hunter: Five hours!

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. S.G. WADE: —to get testing.

The Hon. I.K. Hunter: Five hours, Stephen.

The PRESIDENT: Order! Minister, please continue.

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. S.G. WADE: Let me give you some illustrations of that reality. In the last five days—

The Hon. I.K. Hunter: Do you think five hours is reasonable?

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. S.G. WADE: In the last five days—

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: The Hon. Mr Hunter, the Hon. Mr Wortley, let's listen to the answer.

The Hon. I.K. Hunter: We did, sir. We're not getting an answer.

The PRESIDENT: The Hon. Mr Hunter, that wasn't an invitation to have a conversation.

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order! Minister, please continue.

The Hon. S.G. WADE: The Hon. Irene Pnevmatikos quite rightly asks why do we have line-ups at the clinics. The reason why we have line-ups at the clinics is because we've had a superb response from South Australians to the call, and the call from Nicola Spurrier in particular, to get tested. So out of the last seven days, five of those days have seen more than 2,000 tests—quite extraordinary. In fact, on 17 July, which I think was last Friday, we had 2,374 samples. Congratulations to the people of South Australia: that is a record for this pandemic.

This is very encouraging because we haven't had a case of community transmission in South Australia since March. There is a lot of concern amongst the public health team, as demonstrated by posters on bus shelters, that complacency could undermine people's willingness to go and get tested. So to have a record result last Friday is very encouraging because testing is important to make sure that we are identify a case—

The Hon. I.K. Hunter: A record five hours, Stephen.

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. S.G. WADE: —to make sure a case does not become—

The Hon. I.K. Hunter: How can you be proud of five hours?

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. S.G. WADE: —a cluster and a cluster does not become an outbreak. We have seen what can happen. We've seen what's happened in Victoria. We are working night and day to make sure that does not happen in South Australia. We will continue to—

The Hon. I.K. Hunter: Make people wait five hours.

The PRESIDENT: Order! The Hon. Mr Hunter!

The Hon. S.G. WADE: —build our clinical response to try to reduce the times. But one thing that I can assure the people of South Australia is the latest advice I have is that, in spite of that increase in demand, the turnaround in the test results is still about a day, which is exceptional.

We have reports from other jurisdictions where people are waiting a number of days to get test results. It's really important that SA Pathology continues to achieve what they are achieving, which is very good turnaround times, because as soon as we identify a case that case can be isolated and their close contacts isolated to ensure that we minimise the spread.

The Hon. I.K. Hunter interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order!

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