2 new Covid-19 clusters detected, including one linked to NTUC Fairprice outlet in Kallang Bahru
- MOH reported two new clusters — one at an NTUC Fairprice supermarket at Kallang Bahru, and another linked to an individual
- The number of patients who are in intensive care units has fallen from eight the day before to seven
- As of Aug 19, 77 per cent of the population had completed their full regimen or received two doses of Covid-19 vaccines
SINGAPORE — Singapore reported two new Covid-19 clusters on Friday (Aug 20) and saw a dip in the number of patients under intensive care or in serious condition.
In its nightly update on the coronavirus situation here, the Ministry of Health (MOH) said that four Covid-19 cases have been linked to a new cluster at the NTUC FairPrice supermarket branch at Kallang Bahru.
Another cluster linked to an individual has three cases, though MOH did not provide more information on the person.
In addition, data from the ministry showed that the number of patients who are in intensive care units (ICUs) has fallen from eight the day before to seven on Friday.
There are 27 patients who are in serious condition and need oxygen support to help them breathe, down from the 29 reported the day before.
Among the 34 with serious illness and in ICU, four are fully vaccinated while 27 are patients aged above 60, of whom 23 are not vaccinated or partially vaccinated, MOH said.
It stressed that there is continuing evidence that “almost all fully vaccinated individuals do not suffer serious disease when infected unless they had underlying medical conditions that made them more susceptible”.
Over the last 28 days, the percentage of unvaccinated who became severely ill or died is 9.2 per cent, while that for the fully vaccinated is 1.7 per cent.
There are 380 Covid-19 patients who are hospitalised as of Friday, down from 391 the day before.
Overall, the number of new cases in the community has gone down from 380 in the week before to 281 in the past week.
The number of cases with no known links in the community has also gone down from 99 in the week before to 84 in the past week.
The seven-day moving average number of all linked community cases and all unlinked community cases are 28.1 and 12.0 respectively.
77 ACTIVE CLUSTERS
While there were two new clusters reported on Friday, nine others have been closed.
There are now 77 active Covid-19 clusters here, each having between three and 1,155 cases.
Earlier on Friday, MOH said that Singapore recorded 36 new locally transmitted Covid-19 cases, including 14 that were not linked to earlier infections.
Of the 22 cases that were linked to confirmed cases, 19 had already been placed under quarantine and another three were detected through surveillance testing.
Apart from the locally transmitted cases, there were four imported cases. Of these three were detected on arrival while one developed illness while serving a stay-home notice or in isolation.
In total, there were 40 new cases of Covid-19 on Friday.
The 36 locally transmitted cases were seven more than the 29 reported on Thursday.
Thursday’s tally was the lowest number of locally transmitted cases since July 13, when 19 such cases were reported.
The country has recorded 66,406 coronavirus cases and 47 deaths since the start of the pandemic.
VACCINATIONS
As of Aug 19, 77 per cent of the population had completed their full regimen or received two doses of Covid-19 vaccines, and 82 per cent had received at least one dose.
For other vaccines recognised in the World Health Organization’s Emergency Use Listing such as Sinovac, 154,936 doses had been administered as of Aug 19, covering 84,281 individuals.
