The backlog of elective surgeries in South Australia is set to rise, as the state government concedes next Thursday's public holiday will likely trigger staff shortages across the health system.
On Sunday, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese announced September 22 would be a one-off national holiday to commemorate Queen Elizabeth II's death.
In South Australia, schools and childcare centres will be closed, while the government is to provide shops with a special exemption to trade.
Retailers will be asked not to open until after midday, as a mark of respect.
After a cabinet meeting, Premier Peter Malinauskas said the public holiday would impact the state's health system.
"[September 22] being declared a public holiday will initiate various industrial arrangements … across the health system," he said.
"The government will be seeking to maintain as much elective surgery as possible on the public holiday, the constraint is simply getting access to staff.
"A lot of health workers will have to look after children because their children won't be able to go to child care or school."
Currently, 3,405 South Australians are considered "overdue" for their elective surgery, according to SA Health data.
Mr Malinauskas said it would take until the end of the week for SA Health to determine how many surgeries would be cancelled in public hospitals.
"We're asking patients who do have elective surgeries booked for September 22 to not call hospitals until Friday this week," he said.
Opposition health spokeswoman Ashton Hurn said the government needed to provide "as much clarity, as quickly as possible".
"We know some patients have already been waiting months to get the surgery they need," she said.
Ramping statistics for August due this week
The Premier also promised the latest ramping statistics for August, which are now due, would be released this week.
"I think the initial plan was to release those on Friday, but given the events, that was delayed," he said.
"I wouldn't want to stand accused of rushing things out in a way that wasn't consistent with the respect the event deserved."
Despite that, last Friday SA Health revealed 63 people had died with COVID-19 between April 27 to August 18th – the largest death toll to be reported in one day.
The Premier deflected questions about why that data was released, but not ramping data.
"Look, you're damned if you do, you're damned if you don't, in terms of getting statistics out," Mr Malinauskas said.
In July, a total of 3, 647 hours were lost to ramping, down slightly from 3,854 hours in June – the worst in South Australian history.
Mr Malinauskas said he anticipated ramping numbers would remain high in August.
