Sick snub COVID-19 testing pleas as SA Health warns of mounting complacency
Thousands of sick South Australians are snubbing official pleas to get a COVID-19 test, leaving medical authorities frustrated their public health message is falling on deaf ears.
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Thousands of sick South Australians are ignoring official pleas to have COVID-19 tests, new evidence suggests, prompting authorities to warn complacency is an “ever-present threat” to the state’s safety.
An SA Health survey found almost three-quarters of respondents who were unwell last month had not been tested and did not plan to have a test.
The “disappointing” findings emerged as separate Commonwealth data showed the state’s testing had fallen below the national average.
The State Government has repeatedly warned the public against complacency, while officials say high levels of testing provides confidence to ease lockdown restrictions.
As SA Health revealed a fifth day in a row of zero new cases and virus tests hit 160,000 on Saturday night, authorities urged sick people with even the most minor of flu-like symptoms to get checked.
There are three “active” virus patients in the state.
Health Minister Stephen Wade said medical advice was clear.
“It is vital that South Australians are doubly alert to even slight symptoms and quick to get tested,” he said.
“Complacency is an ever-present threat to the health and safety of our state. We are not free of COVID.
“We have a major outbreak next door (in Victoria).”
The Wellbeing SA June survey of 1621 people across the state found almost a fifth had reported symptoms such as runny nose, a cough or sore throat in the previous week.
But in findings that SA chief public health officer Nicola Spurrier described as a “little bit disappointing”, 72 per cent of those unwell “had not tested nor planned to do so”. A fifth of the ill were tested and 7 per cent planned to be checked.
Federal Government figures show SA has the fourth highest testing rate with 8994 per 100,000 people. Nationally, it is 10,281 per 100,000.
Prof Spurrier, the state’s top public medico, urged anyone with a cold, sore throat, cough, runny nose, loss of smell or taste, or suffering from a fever, to “please get a COVID-19 test straight away”.
Having a test, she said, was easy and painless at dozens of clinics or drive-through sites.
“South Australians have done a tremendous job responding to COVID-19 and the key to our continued success is what we do going forward,” she said.
“The high rates of testing across our state have meant that we have been able to detect every case quickly and stop the chains of transmission of the virus to other people. The truth is that we will have more positive cases.
“The only way my team and I can stop the virus spreading across the community is by picking up every new case quickly, and that only can be done if people who are sick, even mildly unwell, get tested.
“The only way we will (also) remain in this good position, with life more or less back to normal, is if we all get tested when we get sick.”
Her comments came as 102 passengers flew into Adelaide from Kuala Lumpur on Saturday morning. Another flight is due on Tuesday.
Travellers began mandatory fortnight quarantine at various city hotels on Saturday night as they awaited test results.
Official figures show a quarantined person costs taxpayers more than $2806.
But Mr Wade said the Government was investigating “cost recovery” from returned travellers. Meanwhile, 24 SES volunteers have been trained as paramedics in COVID-19 preparations.