The closure of Bukit Merah View Market and Food Centre will be extended to June 26, after nine more cases were linked to the cluster yesterday, which took the total number of linked cases to 25.
The centre has been closed since Sunday, and was meant to reopen today.
There were 14 confirmed community cases yesterday.
Telok Blangah Drive Food Centre will be closed for deep cleaning from today till Friday after a hawker there tested positive. Testing of stallholders at Redhill Market and Food Centre continued today after an infected person was found to have visited the place.
Three of the nine cases announced by the Ministry of Health (MOH) yesterday were food stall vendors at Bukit Merah View Market and Food Centre. The other six include a supervisor at Keong Hong Construction, a cleaner employed by Sats Facility Management and two retirees. A sales executive at Halnaz Frozen Goods and a teacher at KidsCampus (Chai Chee) were also linked to the cluster.
The teacher, a 35-year-old woman, is a family member of a previous case, a 42-year-old man who works as a hawker at Telok Blangah Drive Food Centre and who tested positive on Monday.
However, as the hawker did not declare the teacher as his close contact, she was not put on quarantine. She is asymptomatic and was detected when she went for a Covid-19 test at a general practitioner clinic on Monday. She tested positive later in the day.
The detection of more cases among market and food centre staff at Bukit Merah View and their close contacts suggests there is ongoing spread with wider transmission, said MOH yesterday.
People who visited the shops at 115 and 116 Bukit Merah View between May 25 and June 12 are advised to monitor their health closely and minimise social interactions as far as possible for 14 days from their date of visit. They should also see a doctor immediately if they feel unwell. Free Covid-19 testing is available for this group.
Aside from the nine cases linked to the Bukit Merah centre cluster, there was one other linked case last night - a 35-year-old senior executive at Nets.
Four unlinked cases were also announced, including a 41-year-old migrant domestic worker. After she developed symptoms on Monday, her employer took her to a regional screening centre (RSC) and she later tested positive.
MOH said yesterday that those who are unwell or have medical concerns should consult their primary care doctors, and should not go directly to an RSC to get tested unless invited to do so.
There were no cases in migrant workers' dormitories, and no imported cases for the first time since June 29 last year. The 14 new cases bring Singapore's total to 62,315.
On the precautionary testing at Redhill, Radin Mas MP Melvin Yong said most stallholders agreed that getting tested is the responsible thing to do. "Let's continue to support our hawkers and market stallholders during this difficult time," he wrote on Facebook.
