News

1,767 COVID-19 Cases Reported on 5 Nov; Low Count Due to Fewer Swabs During Deepavali

2021-11-06 , 8:34 am

A year ago, having over 1,000 new COVID-19 cases a day would have alarmed us. Now, it’s cause for celebration.

Unfortunately, this isn’t an accurate reflection of our COVID-19 situation. The Ministry of Health (MOH) explained that the lower case count yesterday (5 Nov) is likely due to fewer swabs being done over the Deepavali holiday at Public Health Preparedness Clinics (PHPCs) and polyclinics.

And sadly, nearly 10 more COVID-19 patients succumbed to the disease.

9 COVID-19 Fatalities

Nine more COVID-19 cases passed away from complications, taking our death toll to 468.

Aged between 67 and 85, all of them had various underlying medical conditions.

1,767 New COVID-19 Cases

1,767 new COVID-19 cases were reported yesterday (5 Nov), the lowest daily case count since 27 Sep when 1,647 infections were recorded.

The cases comprise 1,639 infections in the community, 120 in migrant worker dormitories, and eight imported infections.

Among the local cases are 284 seniors above 60.

MOH Closely Monitoring Five Large Clusters with New Cases

MOH said it’s monitoring five large clusters with new cases, the largest of which remains the cluster at the Institute of Mental Health (IMH).

With 24 new cases, it now has 365 infections, comprising 341 patients and 24 staff members.

One new case each was added to the clusters at Growing Learners Student Care (GLSC) and at Banyan Home @ Pelangi Village, taking their totals to 16 and 95 respectively. 12 students have been infected at GLSC, while all but one of the cases at the assisted living facility are residents.

The two remaining cases are:

Jamiyah Home for the Aged (Tampines) – four new cases, 54 in total
Orange Valley Nursing Home (Clementi) – four new cases, 26 in total

1,699 COVID-19 Cases in Hospital; 140 in ICU

At the moment, there are 1,699 COVID-19 cases warded in hospitals, most of whom are well and under observation.

282 serious cases require oxygen supplementation and 140 are in the intensive care unit, comprising 70 cases who are unstable and under close monitoring, and 70 who are critically ill and intubated.

Over the past seven days, the number of fully vaccinated and non-fully vaccinated cases who have been critically ill in the ICU are at 0.5 and 4.8 per 100,000 population respectively.

The same figures for seniors aged 60 and above are 1.8 and 38.3 respectively.

Over the same period, the number of fully vaccinated and non-fully vaccinated cases who died are 0.1 and 0.9 per 100,000 population respectively.

The same figures for seniors aged 60 and above are 0.3 and 8.5 respectively.

Currently, 85% of our population has been fully vaccinated and 85% have received at least one dose. 17% have received their booster shots.

Weekly Infection Growth Rate Continues to Drop

The weekly infection growth rate is 0.81 as of Friday, the third consecutive day that it has remained below 1.

This refers to the ratio of community cases for the past week over the week before.

This is good news as co-chair of the COVID-19 task force Lawrence Wong said last month that some COVID-19 measures may be eased if the weekly infection growth rate drops below 1.