It makes sense to treat Omicron as no different from other existing and past Covid-19 variants, said experts, because evidence has shown that the new strain is likely to be more transmissible but less severe than the Delta variant.
Since Monday, those infected with the Omicron variant have been allowed to recover at home or in community care facilities, after about a month of strict measures to reduce and slow down the spread of Omicron in Singapore.
Over the past month, those infected with Omicron were either isolated at the National Centre for Infectious Diseases or at dedicated facilities.
"If Singapore still continued to treat the Omicron variant differently, then we will be at risk of... filling up our healthcare facilities with relatively well patients," said Associate Professor Hsu Li Yang, an infectious diseases expert at the National University of Singapore's (NUS) Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health.
The school's vice-dean of research, Associate Professor Alex Cook, added: "I don't think we could maintain strict contact tracing and isolation for long for Omicron anyway."
The Ministry of Health (MOH) said on Sunday that Singapore's Omicron cases so far had not been severe, with none requiring intensive care or oxygen supplementation. But the ministry noted that this may be partially due to most cases being fully vaccinated and from younger age groups.
But it was prudent and crucial to have strictly ring-fenced the Omicron cases over the past month, as it allowed the country to buy time and let the science catch up with the concerns about the new strain, said Professor Dale Fisher, senior consultant at the National University Hospital's Division of Infectious Diseases.
"Once a variant is identified, it will take some weeks to understand the outcomes. This was about slowing the entry and spread of Omicron until we knew the disease was not escaping the vaccine's protection and was not more severe," he added.
He also observed that Singapore is one of the earliest countries to accept that Omicron is not threatening nationally as a large proportion of the population is vaccinated.
He said: "Some countries are seeing overwhelmed hospitals again because Omicron is more transmissible and the baseline immunity of the population is still low."
But having to deal with Omicron after a long and hard battle with Delta is damaging to people's mental and physical well-being, the experts said.
Professor Teo Yik Ying, dean of the NUS Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health, said: "The costs are the overall mental well-being of our people since we saw a suspension of our VTLs (vaccinated travel lanes) as well as a constant shadow cast over the economy by Omicron."
MOH had announced last Wednesday the suspension of all VTL ticket sales for entry into Singapore between Dec 23 and Jan 20.
Finance Minister Lawrence Wong said in a Facebook post on Monday that the Republic must expect a new wave of Covid-19 cases in the coming days and weeks due to Omicron.
As at Saturday, there were 546 confirmed Omicron cases here, of which 443 were imported and 103 were local cases. On Monday and yesterday, a total of 235 new Omicron cases were confirmed.
With the new variant's higher transmissibility, it is likely that the Omicron wave would lead to more infections compared with the Delta wave over the past few months, said experts.
But if severe disease, hospitalisations and intensive care unit admissions do not escalate, transmissions of mild disease of any variant does not matter so much, said Prof Fisher.
Prof Hsu's main concern is about children below 12 who may be unvaccinated during the wave, given that the vaccination drive for upper primary students just started.
"School is due to start next week and the majority may not complete their vaccination by the time our own Omicron wave peaks. We may see more hospitalisations among this group, even though the variant is not as deadly as Delta," he added.
