SA Health scrambles as 72 Adelaide Hills Covid tests vanish

South Australians stuck in isolation while waiting for test results to come back say they are furious after revelations more of another testing bungle in the Hills.

Dozens of Covid-19 tests have gone missing, sparking an urgent investigation as authorities scramble to contact isolating South Australians.

In the second blunder of its type in a month, SA Pathology revealed on Wednesday that it had lost at least 72 samples from its Mount Barker testing clinic on Monday.

Authorities were on Wednesday night contacting patients to get retested as a “priority”.

Under state law, people must stay in quarantine until they receive a negative result.

Some patients spoke of their anger at being stuck in mandatory isolation. One said they had waited two days to contact SA Health and missed important medical appointments.

It remains unclear how the mistake occurred but SA Health is investigating if transport issues from the Adelaide Hills contributed.

An SA Health Covid testing station. Picture: Brenton Edwards/File

Officials say there have been no further reports of misplaced swabs.

In a statement issued late on Wednesday in response to inquiries, an SA Pathology spokeswoman said: “We are investigating the location of 72 missing samples taken at Mount Barker on Monday and are in the process of contacting those impacted to arrange retesting as a priority.”

She said SA Pathology makes every effort to ensure specimens collected across the state were effectively transported to Adelaide for processing.

Chief public health officer, Professor Nicola Spurrier, had earlier urged people to keep getting tested as there were no waiting times and results were being quickly returned.

The major blunder emerged nearly a month after a container filled with more than 100 Covid-19 test swabs and blood samples went missing while being transported from Mount Gambier to Adelaide.

It was later found after an error from a “delay with the external courier”.

SA Pathology was also recently been hit with two testing failures in a fortnight.

It last month revealed 67 patients were sent false results, leaving doctors scrambling to track them all down.

Authorities also sent a wrong text message to 34 patients advising an initial negative result was actually a positive reading, forcing a second official apology.

The blunder, identified four days later, meant ­infectious patients were not sent into 10 days’ quarantine.

A further 33 people were told they had positive results but were, in fact, clear.

There was a similar blunder on New Year’s Eve, which prompted an overhaul and a promise to avoid such an incident being repeated.

That failure involved 11 ­patients.