Again Covid case rises in Singapore, health minister warns

The World Health Organization (WHO) announced that 'Lambda', a new variant of the coronavirus disease (Covid-19), has been found.

At a time when the world including India is seeing decreasing trends of Covid virus, Singapore is facing another Covid-19 wave. The estimate daily case count has jumped to around 2,000, officials said.

The number of daily cases has been rapidly rising, and has doubled as compared to three weeks ago when it stood at about 1,000.

Singapore recorded up to 4,000 daily cases when it was on the peak. The government had then imposed strict curbs, that mandated the wearing of masks and restricted public movement. However, no such restrictions are being planned to address the current surge in infections, Health Minister Ong Ye Kung said, while speaking to the local media.

The government will treat this as an endemic disease, Kung added. Even as the minister indicated that there is no major health risk posed by the virus, he noted that hospitalisations may increase in the coming weeks as more people may fall sick.

“…there has been no evidence to suggest that the new variants are more likely to lead to severe illnesses compared to previous variants,” Kung told Channel News Asia.

“All indications show that current vaccines continue to work well in protecting us against severe illnesses if infected by these new variants,” he added.

The spate of these recent cases is driven by mostly two variants – the EG.5 and its sub-lineage HK.3 – both of which are descendants of the XBB Omicron variant. “Together, they now account for over 75 per cent of our daily cases,” the minister said.