Singapore hit by ‘mystery’ blip surge in Covid cases

Singapore’s healthcare system is in danger of being “overwhelmed” by a sudden surge in Covid-19 cases, health officials have warned just a week after the city-state opens its border to quarantine-free travel from countries including the UK.

Singapore recorded 5,324 new infections on Wednesday, the “highest such figure since the beginning of the pandemic”, according to Reuters. The Ministry of Health said that officials were “looking into this unusual surge in cases within a relatively short window, and closely monitoring the trends for the next few days”.

Sudden spike

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As of Wednesday, 20,895 people in Singapore were recovering from Covid in their own homes, with a further 4,589 in community care facilities, 849 in treatment facilities and 1,777 in hospitals.

A total of ten new Covid-related deaths were recorded, taking the national total to 349.

Latest Our World in Data tracking shows that almost 78% of Singapore’s population are fully vaccinated – the seventh-highest rate of inoculation in the world.

While the city-state’s borders are opening to a growing list of countries, the authorities were forced to extend “social curbs last week to contain the spread of Covid-19 for about a month in order to ease the pressure on the healthcare system”, Al Jazeera said.

The curbs include “limiting social interactions and dining out to two people”, Reuters reported.

Infection rates had been creeping up steadily following the recent introduction of quarantine-free travel, before spiking suddenly this week. Lawrence Wong, co-chair of a government taskforce fighting Covid-19, warned last week that “at the current situation, we face considerable risk of the healthcare system being overwhelmed”.

“We are trying to add capacity,” he told reporters. “But it’s not simply a matter of having extra beds or purchasing new equipment because our medical personnel are stretched and fatigued.

“And while we are trying to reinforce the team, it will take time for these reinforcements to come in.”

Hope and fear

The “mystery surge” on Wednesday sparked panic, but the “daily case count fell back to its recent baseline” yesterday, Bloomberg reported. A total of 3,432 cases were reported on Thursday, according to Health Ministry figures.

However, the weekly infection growth rate remains at 1.13, prompting authorities to warn that “they want to see this fall below one before they can ease domestic social curbs further”, the news site added.

Like many of its Asia-Pacific neighbours, Singapore is in the process of relaxing its policy of eliminating the virus entirely from within its borders. New Zealand, Australia and Vietnam have all ditched zero-Covid plans, leaving China as the only notable outlier in the region.

Singapore’s Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said earlier this month that the global business hub could not stay “locked down and closed off indefinitely” and needed to press on with the “strategy of living with Covid-19”.

This strategy includes the Vaccinated Travel Lane (VTL) scheme, which began with Brunei and Germany, and has been extended to include Canada, Denmark, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, the UK and the US. Fully vaccinated travellers from Australia and Switzerland will also be allowed quarantine-free entry to Singapore from 8 November.

As Singapore’s gradual shift away from a zero-Covid approach continues, “the question authorities face” is “how to avert surges among older people and those with weak immune systems”, said Reuters correspondent Aradhana Aravindan.

“Fully vaccinated people made up about 30% of deaths over the last month,” she reported last week. Patients “older than 60 with underlying medical woes” make up the majority of these deaths, “in line with studies showing that vaccines offer less protection to the old”.

Health Minister Ong Ye Kung warned last week that the number of infections among unvaccinated people “continues to be high”, adding that unjabbed people accounted for two-thirds of patients who have died.

And “jitters are growing with rising cases”, said The Economist. Following this week’s sudden spike in infections, such fears are likely to increase further.