COVID-19 Vaccine Mandate for Health Staff Dropped in South Australia

A medic prepares two vials of COVID-19 vaccines. Hazem Bader/AFP via Getty Images

South Australian Health has ended its COVID-19 vaccine mandate for staff who have contact with patients.

This comes after 245 staff were terminated following a misconduct process for not complying with the department’s vaccination policy.

Department of Health and Wellbeing Chief Executive Robyn Lawrence said the evidence now suggests that it is safe to remove the requirement for vaccination.

“This change has been made as time has passed. It’s now almost five years since COVID first came into the world. And on the basis that essentially all our community has now come into contact with COVID and had at least one infection with it. Many of us has have had more,” he told media.

Dr. Lawrence said the department still highly recommends that the community continues to be vaccinated, in particular if they are of higher risk.

The department’s vaccination policy (pdf) confirms the chief executive approved changing COVID-19 vaccine from mandatory to strongly recommended for category A and category B workers.

Staff in these categories have contact with patients or work in high risk clinical areas. Category C workers do not have any direct physical contact with patients or clients or work with infectious material.

Mumps, rubella, and chickenpox vaccines are all still mandatory under the department’s vaccination policy, while influenza is also strongly recommended.

Dr. Lawrence said the health department have continued to fill the positions of staff who were terminated in relation to the vaccination policy.

She explained the health department has a misconduct process for any staff member who doesn’t comply with policy or behave in a way which may not be befitting the SA Health system.

“There’s a very wide array of things that could be dealt with in misconduct, but in this case it was about failure to comply with a policy and that process was what resulted in them being terminated,” she said.

Unvaccinated Staff Welcome to Reapply

Dr. Lawrence said the department would welcome all sacked staff to reapply.

“The 245 jobs would have been across a wide array of locations and professional groups within the healthcare setting. Where a job becomes vacant, we will seek to fill that role as quickly as possible. Having said that, we do have vacancies across a range of areas in SA Health and we advertise them regularly,” she said.

“The change to the vaccine policy will have no impact on ramping directly. I think we’ve said repeatedly, we’ve continued to fill the positions of staff that we terminated through this process.

“What it will do is allow any staff member who would like to come back to into SA Health to apply to come back and we welcome all of those staff.”

Responding to the news, the Australian Firefighters Alliance said Victoria is now the only state or territory with active mandates.

“Does the science change at the border,” the alliance wrote in a post to X. 

The Victorian Health department website states it is continuing vaccination requirements for some healthcare workers because “we will be living with COVID for some time.”

In May, New South Wales Health ended its for all health workers and students after nearly three years.

“COVID-19 vaccination changed from required to strongly recommended for all NSW Health workers,” the policy dated May 16 states (pdf).

In Queensland, the COVID-19 vaccine mandate for health staff was repealed in late 2023.

Queensland Health acting Director Michael Walsh said his decision had been informed by submissions, employee feedback, human rights assessment, expert clinical advice, and advice from the Australian Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation.

“​​I will continue to enforce the message to our people that if they are unwell they should stay at home. As with all communicable diseases, we will continue to encourage our staff to stay up to date with their vaccinations, including COVID-19,” he said at the time.

The latest Australian Immunisation Handbook continues to recommend the COVID-19 vaccine for all individuals aged 18 and over, and for those between six months and 18 years with medical conditions that may place them at risk of severe disease or death from the virus.

“Most people require one dose for their primary course. People with severe immunocompromise are recommended two primary doses and can consider a third. Further doses every six or 12 months are recommended, or can be considered, based on an individual’s age and presence of risk factors for severe disease,” the handbook states.