Speaking after this morning’s COVID ready committee meeting, Marshall said all elective surgery except category one and urgent category two appointments would be put on hold in a bid to boost health care capacity for a “very imminent and likely increase in hospitalisations across our state”.

“We’re doing this to preserve our health workforce for the important task which lies ahead with the Omicron variant,” he told reporters.

SA Health this afternoon reported another 1472 cases today, on top of 995 reported on Tuesday, although the number of hospitalisations is unchanged.

The state’s daily caseload has surged since December 15 when only 25 COVID-19 cases were detected, with more than 6000 people now infected since borders opened on November 23.

According to SA Health, there are currently 37 patients in hospital, including four people in intensive care and one man in his 30s on ventilation.

Today’s new cases include 135 children, 94 teenagers, 654 women aged between 18 and 100 and 587 men aged between 18 and 98. SA Health said the demographics of two cases are unknown.

Of the new cases, 725 are vaccinated, 67 are unvaccinated while the vaccination status of a further 680 is unknown to SA Health.

There are currently 6316 active cases in the state, of which 93 are in a medi-hotel while 6186 are in home quarantine.

Marshall said South Australia’s daily case numbers were doubling “every three or four days”.

“We’ve got to put every single effort to reduce our mobility here in South Australia to make sure that we don’t have all infections hitting at exactly the same time,” he said.

“Please take our call to work from home very seriously.

“We’ve already put some of those rules and protocols in place right across the public service in South Australia.

“But we’re asking every every single employer in the state to do what they can to reduce this transmission by asking their workforce where possible to work from home.”

Marshall also said Police Commissioner Grant Stevens was preparing a direction to mandate booster vaccines for frontline health workers.

“We are very likely now to move to make it mandatory to have three doses … for all of our frontline health workers, disability workers in South Australia and also those working in aged care,” he said.

“It will be a requirement for people to have that booster within two weeks of when they become eligible for them to be considered fully vaccinated.

“It’s very important that we get those people on the frontline as protected as possible, because we’ve got to make sure that we preserve as much of our health workforce as we possibly can through this period.”

Double vaccination mandates are already in place for police, teachers and airport passenger transport workers, although this is the first time the State Government has signalled its intention to mandate a third dose in any sector.

It comes as long queues continue to plague South Australia’s testing sites, with SA Health reporting wait times upwards of six hours at the Victoria Park drive through clinic this morning.

The Hampstead testing site in Adelaide’s northern suburbs also reported wait times of six hours, while Aldinga (five hours), Adelaide Airport (four hours) and Ridgehaven (three to four hours) and The Royal Adelaide Hospital (3.5 hours) have had similarly long queues, according to SA Health.

Marshall said his “strong advice” was for anyone needing a PCR test to book in.

“We keep hearing reports that people turn up and they’ve been in that line sometimes in pretty tough hot conditions for 5, 6, 7, 8 hours,” he said.

“There is no need to do this. I checked with SA Health again this morning, those people that are booking in are going through in a prioritised way, they’re getting through in an hour or just over an hour.”

Marshall said the Queensland Government’s decision to scrap pre-arrival PCR tests for those travelling from SA to Qld from January 1 would ease pressure on testing sites, although called for the state to drop the requirement earlier.

“This is very important for us because even yesterday 1750 of our finite PCR tests were dedicated to a pre departure test for Queensland,” he said.

“So we will not be doing any pre departure tests for any state going forward.”

SA Health reported 22,742 tests administered on Tuesday.

South Australia’s case numbers appear to be on a similar trajectory to New South Wales and Victoria.

NSW reported 11,201 cases on Wednesday, nearly double the 6062 it posted on Tuesday.

The state currently has 625 people in hospital with the virus, including 61 in intensive care, and recorded another three deaths overnight.

Victoria today recorded 3767 new cases and five deaths, with 397 patients currenlty hospitalised.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison has called a meeting of national cabinet tomorrow as COVID-19 cases soar across the country.

Marshall said he hoped a “nationally consistent test trace, isolate and quarantine protocols” would emerge from the meeting, as well as an update on the use of rapid antigen tests across the country.

The premier rejected calls from the Labor Party to make the use of rapid tests free in South Australia.

Shadow health spokesperson Chris Picton said today’s elective surgery announcement would be a “devastating blow” to those on waiting lists.

“There are 18,726 South Australians waiting for elective surgery, and 2,010 of them are already overdue,” he said. 

“The vast majority of these patients would be Category 2 or 3 surgery patients who now face an uncertain future for their operation. 

“The fact these cancellations are happening here but not elsewhere around the country shows just how vulnerable Steven Marshall has left the health system.”