For the first time, MOH updated us on the total number of cases earlier and it was not through a media briefing, and then released the full details later.
And now is later because more information has been revealed.
They’ve also indicated the progress of the Circuit Breaker and you’d be glad to know that your days of having instant noodles and food delivery have paid off.
623 Cases on 17 April; 558 Are from Dormitories
Out of the 623 cases, 1 of them is imported, and the patient has been serving his or her Stay-Home (or Hotel) Notice.
Cases in the community has dropped to 27—they comprise 22 Singaporeans or Singapore PRs, 4 work passes and 1 visitor.
Work permit holders who live outside of dormitories make up 37 of the new cases.
The remaining 558 cases are work permit holders living in dormitories.
Of all the cases, 69% of them are linked to known clusters while the rest are still pending contact tracing.
There’s also a patient in the public healthcare sector: it’s a 34-year-old Malaysian who works as a nurse in Bright Vision Hospital.
1 More Death
A 95-year-old Singaporean has passed away due to complications from COVID-19 infection on 17 April 2020. The man was tested positive on 13 April 2020.
This brings the total number of deaths caused by COVOID-19 to 11.
Progress on Circuit Breaker
MOH also updated us on the progress of Circuit Breaker based on the number of community cases.
For a start, while it was reported yesterday that there were 48 community cases, the number dropped to 26, as 22 of them were found to reside in dormitories instead.
And I guess you’d know that the number’s looking goody.
MOH does indicate that the “circuit breaker measures appear to have helped, but we still have to monitor carefully the numbers over the next few days.”
Why, you ask.
Because while the number of new cases in the community has dropped, from an average of 40 cases per day in the week before to an average of 32 per day in the past week, MOH is “particularly concerned that it is increasingly difficult to link the new cases and identify the source of infection.”
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The number of unlinked cases in the community has increased by a little, from an average of 19 per day in the week before to an average of 22 per day in the past week.
In fact, it’s revealed that they have an “ ongoing surveillance programme, where a small sample of patients at our primary care facilities are tested for COVID-19 infections”, and some cases were detected from there, which indicated that there are undetected cases in the community.
So yeah; don’t celebrate too early yet.
Updates on Confirmed cases
As mentioned, the total cases in Singapore is now at 5,050.
708 patients have fully recovered and are discharged, while 22 are in ICU. As mentioned earlier, 11 have passed away due to complications from COVID-19 infection.
The conditions of the remaining patients are either stable or improving, and of this group, 2,218 of them who are clinically well but still test positive for COVID-19 are isolated and cared for at community facilities.
You can do your part as a responsible citizen through helping out in contact tracing by downloading the TraceTogether app.
In the meantime, keep yourself updated by bookmarking MOH’s website here and registering for the Gov.sg’s WhatsApp service here.
Or if you’re young, you can join Gov.sg’s Telegram channel and do remember to join the Goody Feed Telegram channel, too.
