Singapore keeps welcome mat despite surging cases

Though encountering a spike in new COVID-19 cases, Singapore is opening its borders to eight more countries for quarantine-free travel starting from Tuesday, according to public health experts.

With one of the highest vaccination rates in the world, the city state is pushing forward its living with COVID policy. It has expanded its vaccinated travel lane by allowing fully vaccinated people from eight countries to enter the island without quarantine, provided they pass their COVID-19 tests. Travelers from Canada, Denmark, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, the United Kingdom and the United States can enter Singapore starting from Tuesday. Visitors from South Korea can enter Singapore from Nov 15.

Even with Singapore recording roughly 3,000 new cases in the past few days, experts believe that the city state is capable of mitigating the risk of gradually opening its borders even in the middle of the pandemic.

As of Saturday, 84 percent of Singapore's population of about 5 million have received two doses of COVID-19 vaccines, while 85 percent have received at least one dose, according to Singapore's Ministry of Health.

Hsu Li Yang, vice-dean of global health in the Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health at the National University of Singapore, said given Singapore's high vaccination rate, "waiting longer to open vaccination travel lanes has little benefit and only significant downsides, as Singapore is a small country that is highly dependent on international trade and tourism".

Hsu said COVID-19 vaccines are "highly effective" in providing protection against severe disease and death. In the case of Singapore, he noted that infection rates are relatively low and that the country has succeeded to inoculate everyone who can or wish to be vaccinated at this point in time.

"Infection rates have been low in Singapore prior to September 2021, with the exception of the migrant worker population living in dormitories. Hence, we are experiencing a surge in cases at this time with the highly infectious Delta variant. However, the proportion of severe cases and deaths has remained low," he said.

In its Sunday report, the health ministry said more than 98 percent of the 70,192 infected individuals had no or mild symptoms over the previous 28 days.

Precautions needed

Paul Anantharajah Tambyah, president of the Asia Pacific Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infection, said Singaporeans are now more familiar with the virus as they had to deal with it for the past two years. As such, they are more likely to take precautions such as wearing masks and practicing social distancing to reduce the risk of getting infected.

Tambyah said Singaporeans also have access to publicly available data from most of the vaccinated travel lane countries, allowing them to identify and avoid high-risk areas.

The Singapore government announced in June that it is drawing a road map of living with COVID-19.Attaining a high vaccination rate is a crucial part of this road map.

As Singapore works to restore its status as a global business and travel hub, the authorities opened up a vaccinated travel lane for travelers from Brunei and Germany on Sept 8.