Cinema Listed as a Place Infectious COVID-19 Has Been To Within a Week Upon Reopening

2020-07-20 , 8:53 am

It hasn’t been long since cinemas were allowed to reopen for business again.

Yet 6 days later, a cinema was identified as a place a Covid-19 patient has been to.

Yesterday (19 July), the Ministry of Health (MOH) reported 257 new Covid-19 cases, bringing the total number to 47,912.

Other than the case numbers, the ministry also added 16 new entries to the list of places where Covid-19 patients have visited during their infectious periods.

The coronavirus is pretty social, indeed.

It includes several eateries, hawker centres and a few shopping malls, including a cinema hall at Bugis+.

In case you can’t read it, here are the new places added to the list:

Chong Pang City Wet Market & Food Centre
Kampung Admiralty Hawker Centre
Ocean Curry Fish Head
Mustafa Centre
HAO Mart
Thasevi Food
the ActiveSG Gym at Fernvale Square
yakitori restaurant LECOQ
a SaladStop! outlet at The Metropolis
food stall 313 KPT
VivoCity
IMM
Sun Plaza
Hall 6 of FilmGarde cinema at Bugis+.

You can view the full list of places here.

More of a visual learner? CNA has this microsite that shows an interactive visual map of the list and it’s quite a scary sight:

Monitor Your Health Carefully:

MOH also said that if you’re in the same area within the same timeframe as the Covid-19 patients, you should monitor your own health carefully.

Should you find yourself developing symptoms for acute respiratory infections, you should see a doctor immediately.

As of July 2020, all individuals, 13 years old and above, will be required to undergo the swab test when they visit a doctor for ARI for the first time, although healthcare professionals have come out to say that the test is “uncomfortable, but relatively painless”.

As for the places that were identified, MOH says that people do not need to avoid them.

The National Environment Agency (NEA) will engage the operators to do a thorough cleaning and disinfection of the affected premises before it is open to the public again.

All close contacts have been identified, MOH added.

Still Can Watch Movie?

Yes, of course you can. In fact, if you’ve watched one recently, you’d know that it feels like a Gold Class seat instead of the usual seats.

I mean, look at this (those in milk are crossed out for safe-distancing):

So even if you’re screaming through the Train to Bishan, you’d need to scream as loud as a parade commander in NDP for your saliva to fly to the other seat. And also, people are supposed to be wearing a mask when they’re in the hall unless they’re eating or drinking.

Obey Safe Distancing Measures

Yes, it’s Phase 2 but the virus hasn’t disappeared.

It doesn’t mean we have to lock ourselves at home to wait out the virus, although limiting your time outside is still a wise choice.

Instead, ensure that you follow all the Covid-19 safety measures put into place.

After all, as this hair salon has shown, if you follow the measures, the chances of infecting other people are lower.

The Multi-Ministry Task Force (MMTF) has said before: everyone must play their part; if even one per cent decides the rules are not worth following, Covid-19 will be here to stay for an even longer time.

After all, how many times have we seen people sitting down and chitchatting while waiting for their food to arrive, even though they should only take off their masks after the food has arrived?

Moral of the story? Go watch a movie with friends if you want to, just make sure to obey all the safe management measures put into place by the cinemas:

In the latest press conference by the multi-ministerial task force, it’s mentioned that we must be prepared for a second wave of COVID-19 infections, and restrictions might be implemented if things go out of control.

Health Minister Gan Kim Yong then said, “If the numbers go up, rather than a hard threshold beyond which we trigger another circuit breaker, or below which we just remain happy, when the numbers go up we do need to look at the nature of the numbers.”

And when it does go up, it might be specific actions targeted at the high-risk areas or activities.

For example (my example of course, not theirs), if many people got infected after watching Train to Busan: Peninsula, then they might not air the movie because the virus from the characters in the movie has spread to moviegoers. Instead, they’ll air happy movies with happy endings like Avengers: Infinity War.

The face of the COVID-19 fight, National Development Minister Lawrence Wong, said, “Basically we will try our very best through a whole range of measures not to have to go to another broad base circuit breaker or lockdown for the whole of Singapore.

“We want to avoid that. We don’t know if we can achieve that outcome, but I believe if everyone cooperates, and through the enhanced capabilities that we have now for testing and tracing, we will be able to do it.”

Now that you know how we all need to work together against Covid-19, you might as well just watch our video on how WiFi routers work and how you can make them fast even at home:

Cinema Listed as a Place Infectious COVID-19 Has Been To Within a Week Upon Reopening

Monitor Your Health Carefully:

Still Can Watch Movie?

Obey Safe Distancing Measures

Here’s a simplified summary of the South Korea martial law that even a 5-year-old would understand:

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