Coronavirus outbreak
On holding events like NDP and whether schools will close
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Q: On what basis does the Government expect the outbreak to at least last till the end of the year?
Health Minister Gan Kim Yong: Judging from some feedback from our experts, including our director of medical services, it's likely to be at least up to the end of the year, or even longer - we really cannot tell. We cannot plan on the basis that this outbreak will be over by a certain period of time, because our plan must be sufficiently flexible to allow us to ensure that we are able to sustain many of the measures over the long term.
Q: What will happen to government events such as the May Day Rally, the National Day Parade (NDP) that usually have large crowds?
National Development Minister Lawrence Wong: I would imagine, for example, if there is a major speech event, a rally, you could potentially have more than one venue. Audiences can sit apart in a room that's not more than 250 (people) in size, and then you can have multiple venues and you can do a video streaming of the speech that's delivered. So I think event organisers, including government agencies planning for speeches and planning for events, will have to adjust accordingly.
Q: Why are we considering letting patients recover at home and not in hospitals?
Mr Gan: In terms of the capacity, what the Prime Minister said is that as we see more patients being infected, it is important for us to strategise our medical approach, focus on those who really need hospital care.
Even today, among our patients in hospital, most of them are doing very well, they do not require a lot of medical support.
Generally, global statistics show that about 80 per cent of patients have very light to mild symptoms, we just need to monitor them in case they deteriorate. And what is (important) is because the person is an infected patient, therefore isolation is critical.
MOH director of medical services Kenneth Mak: We do need to put in place measures such that even if they have diagnosis of Covid-19, there is no concern of risk of spread to other people in the community.
Q: Will Singapore close schools to limit the spread of the virus?
Mr Wong: The evidence on schools is not so clear at this stage.
Based on what experts have presented to the task force, it is quite unusual in this particular Covid-19 experience compared with the normal influenza season, where many children would be infected.
What is not clear is whether it's fewer because their symptoms are so mild that we are not picking them up, or whether it's because somehow this is different from the normal influenza and the children are not as prone to being infected for some reason which we don't quite understand yet.
We won't rule it out but we do need to get better clarity on the effectiveness of school closures and how this can potentially help to break or slow down the transmission chain before we decide on putting in place a measure like that.