8 more serological tests of staff at Mandarin Orchard come back positive; likely past infections: MOH
MOH said last Saturday that it was investigating 13 cases of coronavirus infection among individuals who had served stay-home notice at Mandarin Orchard.
SINGAPORE — The serological tests for eight more staff members at the Mandarin Orchard Singapore hotel have tested positive, the Ministry of Health (MOH) said on Monday (Dec 21), indicating that the cases are “likely past infections”.
This is in addition to the three that had been announced on Sunday.
The polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test results for these 11 employees, however, were negative, so they were not included in the daily case counts, in accordance with the World Health Organization's criterion, MOH said.
In its update on the Covid-19 situation in Singapore, MOH said that epidemiological investigations of these 11 cases are in progress.
The ministry will test the identified close contacts of these 11 cases as a precautionary measure and also conduct serological tests to determine if these individuals could have been infected by them.
MOH said last Saturday that it was investigating 13 cases of coronavirus infection among individuals who had served their stay-home notice at Mandarin Orchard.
The test samples from the 13 were observed to have high genetic similarity despite them having arrived from different countries, including Bahrain, Canada, Indonesia, the United Kingdom and the United States, which suggests that they were likely infected from a similar source, MOH said then.
The ministry said on Monday that it has tested 571 staff members at the hotel, and that the PCR test results for all 571 of these people were negative.
“This means there is no ongoing infection among staff of the hotel,” MOH said.
It stressed that Singapore reports its Covid-19 cases in “accordance with international practice”.
“Every case who tested positive through a PCR test and is assessed to be an acute infection is reported and included in our case count. We follow the World Health Organization’s criterion that only positive results from confirmatory tests (ie. PCR tests) are included in the case count.
“The 11 cases whose serological tests have come back positive, but whose PCR test results are negative for Covid-19 infection, are therefore not included in our daily case count.”
Travellers entering the country are subjected to the prevailing border measures upon entry, including stay-home notices and Covid-19 tests.
The ministry stressed that hotels used as dedicated facilities for travellers to serve their stay-home notices have strict protocols to which all quarantined guests must comply.
“Regular checks on these hotels are conducted to ensure that safe management measures are complied with, and security measures are in place,” MOH said.
“These measures have helped to mitigate the risk of importation and transmission, but travellers must themselves also remain vigilant, and take all precautionary measures to protect themselves and their travelling companions.”
The ministry will continue to investigate the 13 cases of infections among people who had been quarantined at Mandarin Orchard between Oct 22 and Nov 11.
“As a precautionary measure to ensure the safety of all guests, the hotel has stopped accepting new guests since Dec 19, and all existing guests checked out by 9pm on Dec 20. All individuals serving stay-home notice at Mandarin Orchard Singapore have been transported via dedicated vehicles to an alternative stay-home notice dedicated facility on Dec 20,” MOH said.
