SINGAPORE - Catch up on the hottest topics on The Straits Times' weekday talk show.

The Big Story, broadcast every weekday at 5.30pm on Facebook and YouTube, has reporters and senior editors discussing the top stories of the day. The show is helmed by multimedia correspondent Hairianto Diman and assistant video editor Olivia Quay, and airs live from ST's digital studio.

Singapore table tennis player Yu Mengyu is set to face Japan's world No. 2 Mima Ito in the third-place play-off on Thursday (July 29) night. Yu had earlier in the morning lost to China's world No. 1 Chen Meng.

Meanwhile, Singapore's Olympic champion, Joseph Schooling, will begin his title defence in the 100m butterfly on Thursday.

Assistant sports editor Rohit Brijnath weighs in on Schooling's chances of making it through the heats.

Meanwhile, Punggol Primary School staff and pupils are undergoing mandatory swab tests on Thursday and Friday following a growing cluster linked to a cleaner working there.

The school will also switch to home-based learning till Aug 6.

Separately, Village Hotel Sentosa is the latest addition to the Ministry of Health's (MOH's) list of community care facilities designated for those who have contracted Covid-19 but are experiencing mild or no symptoms.

This brings the total number of such designated facilities to six, with the other five being D'Resort NTUC, Tuas South, former Ang Mo Kio Institute of Technical Education, Civil Service Club @ Loyang and Bright Vision Hospital.

In this week's Life Picks, senior food correspondent Wong Ah Yoke recommends his favourite take-away dishes from Birds Of A Feather restaurant, and Taiwanese eatery 8 Degrees, while music correspondent Eddino Abdul Hadi talks about performances to look out for in the Esplanade's annual Red Dot August concert series.

Film correspondent John Lui reviews Jungle Cruise, starring Dwayne Johnson and Emily Blunt.