Experts Say We Should Know if The Circuit Breaker Would be Extended in The Next Few Days

2020-04-21 , 10:16 am

There’s one burning question that’s been on everybody’s minds since 7 Apr.

Will the Circuit Breaker be extended like Malaysia’s MCO?

Well, experts have spoken out and here’s what they have to say:

Next Few Days Will Determine The Fate Of S’pore’s Circuit Breaker

According to experts that ST has spoken to, whether the circuit breaker measures will be lifted on 4 May as planned will depend on the next couple of days.

How effective is CB at breaking the Covid-19 cycles of transmission?

Dr Leong Hoe Nam, probably Singapore’s most famous Covid-19 doctor by now, says the next few days will be “like a mid-year exam”.

He said, the time taken for that person to show symptoms and infect others is 5 days. Theoretically, this means that a single Covid-19 carrier will have the chance to infect “3 cycles” of people by now.

Whether the CB is effective enough to break these cycles will be made known in the coming days.

He added that he wasn’t happy with the current figures, and hoped it would have dropped to between 10 and 15 by now.

Number of cases picked up must be as close to zero as possible

Professor Paul Tambyah from NUS Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine said that the number of new Covid-19 cases picked up by these two sources:

Clinics’ surveillance of influenza-like illnesses
Hospitals’ surveillance of pneumonia

must be as low as possible.

Local cases must drop more

Professor Teo Yik Ying, the dean of the NUS Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health, said it’s “encouraging” to see the average number of cases in the community drop, but he had expected it to be lower.

He felt that there were more areas that have to be strengthened.

Cheem? Let us simplify it for you.

The next few days will be the mid-year exam for the circuit breaker measures.

The examiners are looking at the number of cases in the community as a benchmark.

Based on the class quizzes (daily updates so far) that were taken until now, we’re probably in the B to C range and there’s a lot of stuff we didn’t do.

It’s likely that the circuit breaker will extend because the passing grade for Covid-19 circuit breaker measures must be A+.

99% Complying With The Rules Aren’t Enough

While Singapore has been doing quite well with their circuit breaker rules, it’s not enough.

99% of Singapore’s residents have been complying well with the various circuit breaker measures in place but, according to Dr Leong, it must be 99.99% in order for us to achieve that grade A+.

“Under such circumstances, the virus will still be able to spread, but much less easily than before.”

But if people continue to flout the rules, Covid-19 will never be beaten, Dr Leong once infamously said.

“Absolute compliance is needed to clear all the community cases… If everyone obeys the circuit breaker rules, then the only person you can infect is your family, and thereafter the virus cannot pass on to anyone.”

Lockdowns were proven to work against Covid-19 in countries like New Zealand, Italy and China.

So if it doesn’t work in Singapore, it’s the fault of Singaporeans and other people living in Singapore.

As for what we can do to ace the exam? Safe distancing measures, good hand hygiene and being paranoid for your health (see a doctor if unwell, even for small stuff) are pretty good ways to go about doing so.