Everything You Need to Know About the Latest COVID-19 Press Conference Today (3 Sept)

2021-09-03 , 8:13 pm

Whenever there’s a spike in COVID-19 cases in Singapore and a COVID-19 press conference, chances are, hawkers would frown and we’d all have to dabao again.

But this time, it’s very different, given that Singapore is treating COVID-19 as an endemic disease now, and that our vaccination rate is one of the highest in the world.

However, no: eating in big groups and kissing strangers are still banned.

Reader Bao: When was kissing strangers ever legal—

Here are what you need to know about the latest updates.

No Plans to Have More Restrictions

With over 100 unlinked cases in the last two days, it won’t be a shock if we go back to Phase 2 (Heightened Alert), or even the dreaded Circuit Breaker.

But it would also be a shock because the Government has said that the whole idea of Phase 2 (HA) is to buy time for more people to be vaccinated and not to stop the cases.

According to Finance Minister and Co-Chair of the ministry task force, tightening measures will only be used as a last resort to keep our healthcare system from being overwhelmed.

Currently, despite the high number of cases, the number of serious illnesses hasn’t increased exponentially due to our high vaccination rate.

Thus, there are no plans to tighten curbs.

Mr Wong said, “In the past, when we have a situation of such high daily cases, we would have looked to measures like a heightened alert, or even a circuit breaker to control the infection

“But we are in a new phase, where we have a high level of vaccine coverage to protect Singaporeans, and we are now moving into a phase of living with COVID and becoming COVID-resilient.”

Now, if so, are there plans to loosen curbs?

Well, no.

No Plans to Loosen Restrictions

There are two reasons for this decision: Firstly, it’s unknown whenever these recent infections would lead to serious illnesses yet, and secondly, there might be more infections coming as pilots are being carried out.

Mr Wong said, “We do not intend to make any new opening moves at this juncture, because there is a time lag between the onset of infections to serious illness, and so we want to take some time to monitor the situation.

“Also, we have recently announced a whole series of pilots, be it vaccinated travel or allowing our workers in the dormitories to be out in the community. So we want to allow these pilots to continue over the next few days and weeks before we contemplate further moves.”

Rise in Cases is Expected

MOH’s Director of Medical Services, Prof Kenneth Mak, said that the rise in COVID-19 cases isn’t unexpected as Singapore resumes more activities.

However, despite the surge in cases, there has been no new admissions to the ICU since 21 August.

In other words, if you want to know whether you can finally have that large class gathering, you should probably monitor the number of patients in ICU instead of the number of new cases.

Testing, Testing and More Testing

With most of us vaccinated, the next thing you should focus on is no longer a needle and a dance on TikTok, but a long cotton bud that’s been sent to your house.

Testing, according to the task force, will be a way of life in Singapore.

Mr Wong said, “We want to encourage everyone to consider testing regularly, especially, for example, if you’re going to participate in a high-risk activity or attend a large-scale event and you want to ensure you are free from (the) virus, test yourself on a regular basis.”

Every household will be receiving, or have received, six COVID-19 self-test kits, and COVID-19 test kits are now sold almost everywhere.

And that’s not all: you can now make an appointment for a self-paid test at the 20 Quick Test Centres (QTCs) for a fast and easy test (FET) 1 October.

“Regular testing should not be confined to persons working in higher-risk settings,” Mr Wong added. “In fact, we want to strongly encourage everyone, whether you are vaccinated or not to self-test regularly with antigen rapid test (ART) kits as a matter of social responsibility.”

Simply put, influencers should post more images of themselves doing a swab test so that minions like us would follow.

Booster Shots to be Given to Some People from This Month

Starting from this month, Singapore will give its first Covid-19 booster shots to seniors aged 60 and above, residents of aged-care facilities, and people who are immunocompromised.

The Expert Committee on Covid-19 Vaccination suggests that seniors should receive a booster dose of mRNA vaccine six to nine months after completing their two-dose vaccination regimen, while Those who are immunocompromised should receive a third dose of the same mRNA vaccine two months after their second dose, as this ensures they start off with adequate protective immune response to the virus.

MOH has agreed to these recommendations.

Over in the US, the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has also approved a third dose for immunocompromised individuals, while the WHO is discouraging booster shots so that the jabs can be given to unvaccinated people in poorer countries.

How the Bugis Junction and Bus Interchange Clusters Started

In today’s press conference, the task force also speculated on the cause of the two growing clusters in Singapore now: the Bugis Junction and bus interchange clusters.

Prof Kenneth Mak said that Bugis Junction cluster might have stemmed from an infected visitor to the mall, and employees in the mall might have spread the virus around due to a lack of compliance with safe management measures.

He added, “This is a common situation that we’ve noticed happening in other clusters as well, where it starts off with the introduction from the community coming in and then the workplace if there is insufficient discipline in complying with safe management measures.”

Similarly, the bus interchange clusters could be due to a workplace transmission, too. He said, “It is highly likely that spread has occurred within the work environment, possibly due to mask-off interactions during rest periods at the bus interchanges.”

The number of cases in the bus interchange is slowly coming down, and Health Minister Ong Ye Kung said, “It will take the rest of this week for the situation to stabilise and we anticipate that the number of cases from the interchanges may start coming down in the following week.”

To know how the virus might have spread when people aren’t disciplined, watch this video to the end: