More than a fifth of Covid-19 cases had gone out while sick: MOH
Such irresponsible behaviour has resulted in the coronavirus spreading to more people: Health Minister
More than one in five coronavirus patients continued to go to work or socialise even after they were unwell.
Expressing his concern yesterday, Health Minister Gan Kim Yong urged Singaporeans to practise social responsibility to avoid contributing to the spread of Covid-19 here.
He revealed that 35 of the 160 confirmed cases as of Monday, or about 22 per cent, had not minimised social contact and continued to work or carried on with their daily routines even after developing a fever or respiratory symptoms.
Mr Gan, who co-chairs a multi-ministry task force on Covid-19, said at a press conference that many of the locally transmitted cases were a result of the socially irresponsible actions of a few individuals.
"(They) continued to go to work, and attended events and participated in activities despite being unwell, and went on to spread the disease to their family, friends and other contacts," he said.
He said such behaviour was seen in a few of the local clusters, such as the Wizlearn Technologies and the Safra Jurong private dinner clusters.
The Safra cluster is now the largest with 39 confirmed cases so far, with three of the six new infections yesterday linked to it.
Of the 14 confirmed cases linked to e-learning solutions company Wizlearn Technologies at Science Park, nine are staff members. Three of them continued with their daily activities despite being unwell.
One of the employees spread the virus to a family contact, who also carried on with daily activities while symptomatic.
This resulted in four other people who did not work in the company getting infected, said Mr Gan.
In the case of the Safra Jurong cluster, a person who was already unwell attended a private dinner at Joy Garden Restaurant on Feb 15 and subsequently tested positive.
"This could have resulted in 18 additional cases who were at the dinner," added Mr Gan.
In turn, 10 of the 18 people continued with their daily activities even though they were sick, resulting in another 17 people who were not at the dinner getting infected.
SEE A DOCTOR
"This socially irresponsible behaviour poses a risk to all of us. The measures we have implemented will work only if individuals cooperate and engage in a socially responsible manner.
"So please work together with us, so that we can keep our family and loved ones safe," he said.
Mr Gan noted that some of the patients did not consult a doctor early despite being unwell.
The Ministry of Health has reminded that anyone who is unwell, even with mild flu-like symptoms, should see a doctor and stay at home to prevent spreading the illness to others.
Mr Gan also advised the public to refrain from doctor-hopping so the same doctor can follow up on the case and make an appropriate assessment if a case needs to be tested for Covid-19.
Mr Gan said 38 patients had visited more than one general practitioner (GP) clinic, and eight of them visited three or more GP clinics.
He said government agencies will suspend all social activities for senior citizens for 14 days from today as the elderly are particular vulnerable to Covid-19.
For example, the dinner at Safra Jurong was attended mainly by seniors who also took part in singing classes and other activities at community clubs and residents' committee centres.
Minister for National Development Lawrence Wong, who co-chairs the task force, said the authorities will also look at a fuller range of social distancing measures as the disease continues to spread globally.
These include school closures, staggered hours at workplaces, telecommuting, as well as measures put in place at public events, community activities and religious services.
"We are mindful that these measures can be very disruptive to the lives of Singaporeans," said Mr Wong.
"If you were to do all of them at one time, we will literally have to shut down our city and everything would grind to a halt.
"If you were to start some of them too early, people may become fatigued and then you cannot sustain the measures, and then (they) will not be effective either."
For measures such as school closures, Mr Wong said parents will be given sufficient lead time to prepare.
He stressed that getting the measures right and applying them at the right time are critical.
"By doing so, we put in brakes to try and stop... or slow down the transmission chain and flatten the epidemic curve," Mr Wong said.
Government agencies to suspend all activities for seniors for 14 days
All senior-centric activities conducted by government agencies will be suspended for 14 days from today to reduce the risk of further transmission of the coronavirus among seniors, the Ministry of Health (MOH) said yesterday.
Many of the confirmed cases over the weekend were linked to the Safra Jurong cluster and other social activities, and were mainly seniors who took part in activities such as qigong at community clubs (CCs) and residents' committees (RCs), said MOH.
At a press conference yesterday, Health Minister Gan Kim Yong said: "We encourage seniors to be active, but there is now evidence of Covid-19 transmission among the seniors participating in such social activities, because some individuals who were unwell had continued to participate in them."
He added that seniors are a particularly vulnerable group.
"We want to protect them. We will therefore introduce additional targeted social distancing measures for our seniors," said Mr Gan.
The suspension will include activities held at CCs, RCs, Senior Activity Centres, Active Ageing Hubs, Community Resource Engagement and Support Team (Crest) centres, Health Promotion Board and ActiveSG sport centres.
These new measures are on top of the ones announced on Saturday, where MOH called for a 14-day suspension of all activities and classes in CCs and RCs the confirmed cases had participated in, as well as all singing classes organised by the People's Association (PA) at the affected CCs and RCs.
The PA said in a statement yesterday that some of the guests at the Safra Jurong dinner were participants of its activities in CCs and RCs.
Thus, relevant courses, organised activities and interest group activities in the CCs and RCs that seniors regularly participate in will be suspended, and these include music, drama, dance, basic IT and smartphone skills, and as well as career development classes.
It will affect about 2,600 classes and 11,000 interest groups, with about 290,000 non-unique participants.
PA chief executive director Desmond Tan said care services for seniors, such as nursing homes, inpatient and day hospices, senior care centre services and home-based care services will run as usual.
FURTHER MEASURES
He also said precautionary measures such as health and travel advisories have already been implemented, but further measures, such as reducing the number of participants for each activity will be introduced.
Mr Tan said: "Right now, we are looking at programmes specifically tailored for seniors.
"They do attend programmes that are open to all public, so we will not stop those programmes, but as far as those that are catered for the seniors, we will suspend for the time being."
He said if the courses are unable to continue, participants will get refunds for their classes.
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