Covid booster jabs to be made available for all eligible South Australians from December 1

South Australians who received their second dose of the Covid vaccine six months ago will be able to get a booster shot from December. Here’s how it will work.

South Australians who received their second dose of the Covid vaccine at least six months ago will be able to access Covid booster shots from the beginning of December.

But the shots will not be mandatory and, at this stage, there will be no impact on the vaccine passport and those with two doses will still be considered fully vaccinated.

The boosters were made available to all frontline health and medi-hotel workers from Friday.

Premier Steven Marshall said the program would add “yet another layer of protection” after the state’s borders open on November 23.

“We expect the cohort that will be coming here in the first instance will be those people who are frontline workers because they were the ones who received their original vaccination around about six months ago,” he said on Friday.

Mr Marshall said National Cabinet has not made a final decision on how vaccine booster shots could eventually affect the vaccine passport program, but there were no planned changes to the system.

“My understanding is that, at this stage, just the two doses will be what’s included in the vaccination passport but we’ll get further advice from the National Cabinet,” he said.

“At the moment what we’re saying is that this will increase the protection for people, it’s not mandated but certainly I think most people want to get the very highest level of protection that they can.”

Booking for Pfizer booster doses will be available at all SA Health vaccination clinics. That booster will be available to all eligible people regardless of which vaccine was administered for their initial two doses.

The announcement came after the Australian Hotels Association called on the state government to take action to protect small and medium businesses from a “potential minefield” of disputes with employees.

Ian Horne, head of the association’s SA branch, told the parliamentary Covid response committee on Thursday that a public health order covering the entire industry would relieve small-business owners of the burden of enforcing a jab policy themselves when restrictions ease.

Without a government order, Mr Horne said venue managers would be open to ­industrial relations disputes.

“Our industry is overwhelmingly small and medium and predominantly family-based businesses, and they don’t have an HR function,” he said. “The last thing (they) need is a fight with every employee who doesn’t want to get vaccinated. To leave it in the hands of the individual operators is to cast them out into a potential minefield for industrial actions, disputes and arguments at the door.”

The AHA plea follows Business SA’s call for a vaccine mandate in the hospitality industry.

Mr Horne said the average age of workers in the hospitality industry was 24 to 26. “That (age group) is where there is a slow take-up and not necessarily because they are anti-vaxxers … but simply because that is the nature of young people,” he said.

From Friday, those eligible for booster jabs at SA Health clinics include medi-hotel workers and staff in GP respiratory clinics and Covid testing and processing centres, paramedics, and hospital ED and ICU staff. For a booster, a person must have had a second jab at least six months ago and be aged at least 18.

The Commonwealth will offer boosters to aged- and disability-care staff and residents through GP and respiratory clinics from Monday.

Mr Horne said providing a government-mandated deadline for when workers must be vaccinated would provide a strong incentive for the industry to get jabbed.

Under SA’s Covid-ready plan, public-density restrictions will not change when 80 per cent of the state’s adult population is fully vaccinated, which is expected to happen about November 23.

When the state hits 90 per cent, fully vaccinated people will be allowed to dance in nightclubs, drink standing up and participate in other “high-risk activities”.

Mr Horne said under the plan, it would be “conditional on venues” to enforce a double-vaccination policy for staff and customers.