SA Pathology’s ‘quiet achievers’ set to pass million COVID test milestone
SA Pathology about to mark a major milestone in its world-beating COVID efforts, despite the crisis hitting while it was under a privatisation cloud.
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Tom Dodd is South Australia’s one million man.
In the past year, the SA Pathology clinical service director has overseen a world-beating response to the COVID-19 pandemic, with tests about to top the one million mark.
His team of quiet achievers has also implemented innovations, such as drive-through test stations, SMS result alerts and in-house test kits, when world demand far outstripped supply.
He has also managed to avoid privatisation of the agency – saving millions from the budget.
The one million milestone comes amid concern about a recent fall in testing rates and warnings against complacency. From hasty meetings when people were not even sure of the name of the looming disease, the SA Pathology team has been a backroom hero.
It, along with the contact tracers of the Communicable Disease Control Branch, has contained what elsewhere in the world has been a runaway disaster.
The one million test mark has been achieved with the help of private pathology firms, which account for around 20 per cent of coronavirus tests.
Dr Dodd recalls that in January last year there was talk of a looming pandemic, but the disease did not have an actual name.
Things escalated quickly. Within days of getting the genetic code of the virus, SA Pathology was doing laboratory tests, the first on January 31, after initial tests were sent to Melbourne.\
“We’ve always been very well prepared for a pandemic, but we thought it most likely to be the flu,” Dr Dodd said.
“It turned out to be coronavirus, but we were able to start very quickly.”
A rushed meeting at the Royal Adelaide Hospital with chief public health officer Professor Nicola Spurrier, GPs, the Australian Medical Association and members of the Australian Chinese Medical Association of SA discussed swabbing any arrivals from China who may have a sniffle.
SA’s first confirmed cases of COVID-19 were on February 1 – a Chinese couple from the virus’s epicentre, Wuhan.
As SA Pathology ramped up the testing, the processing time for results came down to about 24 hours.
That is now down to about 12 hours – and people receive an SMS advising of the result, quickly putting minds at ease.
Dr Dodd said that was a major shift; SA Pathology had earlier advised a doctor of the result, who would then advise their patient.
A domiciliary service quickly started, with nurses going to people’s homes, to sporting teams and nursing homes, to minimise the risk of people travelling with COVID-19.
“We were swabbing on an industrial scale, then we started the drive-through clinics, at first at the Repat (in March), and the public responded magnificently,” Dr Dodd said.
“We had a challenging time with the test reagent.
“In late March-April, the whole world wanted the COVID test reagent.
“Most of the world depended on getting the full test kit from companies, but we developed our own.”
There are now about 30 drive-through testing stations across the state, several operated by private pathology firms.
SA Pathology had a test blitz in April, when tests went from around several hundred a day to more than 12,000.
When the Parafield cluster hit in November, a record 12,470 were carried out in a single day.
“Per capita, we were ahead of just about every jurisdiction in the world,” Dr Dodd said.
Mobile test vans were dispatched, teams were sent to border check points and even on to international fishing boats at places such as Port Lincoln. “We swabbed and turned it around in under 24 hours,” Dr Dodd said.
“We have fantastic results, but it is thanks to the South Australian public.
“It really is an amazing story. Our state has responded in a collegiate fashion and it has been a real privilege to be involved.”
A year ago, SA Pathology faced privatisation. It had since achieved a first-year savings target of $7.3m in 2019-20 and was on track to reach $18.3m this financial year, partly through redundancies and closing outlets.
On April 22, Health and Wellbeing Minister Stephen Wade ruled out privatisation, as the agency showed its pivotal role in containing the coronavirus crisis. Dr Dodd said it would reach its savings target this year – but the COVID-19 response had a separate budget.
The agency had put on hundreds of temporary workers in its swab army.
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