Seats fill up on trains as more return to office

Lawyer Crystal Tan is usually able to get a seat when she boards the train on the North-South Line to the city at 8.30am, but yesterday, most of the seats were taken.

Ms Tan, 32, who got on at Sembawang MRT station and alighted at Raffles Place MRT station, said: "There was quite a significant number of people on the train today. Usually, there will be a lot of seats available, but today most of the seats were filled up."

As of yesterday, companies can have up to 50 per cent of their staff back at the office with the easing of Covid-19 restrictions here.

This was not the case from May 8 to Wednesday, when companies largely had their employees working from home, in line with safe management measures.

Mr Ramadass Deenathayalu, 51, who works in Raffles Place, said he enjoys working in the office, adding that his company leaves it to the employees to decide.

"When we work at home, we unknowingly work longer hours. It's not healthy and it's bad for psychological health. We are away from social connections when we work from home. It's better to go out and work with people," said the manager in the software industry.

"I'm looking forward to more human connections and interactions since more people are allowed to go back to the office now."

Across the island, people were walking into malls and buildings without temperature screening - a requirement lifted yesterday.

But some places The Straits Times visited were still conducting such checks, saying they would phase them out in the days to come.

At the AMK Hub, Velocity@Novena Square, Square 2 and Junction 8 malls, shoppers did not need to take their temperatures, with TraceTogether check-in sufficient to allow entry.

But 13 of the 24 eateries ST visited in these four malls were still conducting temperature screening.

Ms Janet Ong, 52, a sales assistant, had her temperature screened before she could have breakfast at Toast Box in AMK Hub yesterday.

She said it was good for eateries to do temperature screening as vaccinated people could still be infected.

A spokesman for Frasers Property Retail previously said that all 14 malls it manages would stop temperature screening from yesterday, but staff will continue to be deployed to facilitate contact tracing.

ST understands that screeners at the 17 malls managed by Far East Organization will also be retained to ensure that shoppers, employees and tenants comply with TraceTogether check-in requirements.

At Yio Chu Kang Sports Hall and the nearby ActiveSG gym, temperature checks remained in place.

A part-time ActiveSG staff member, who wished not to be named, said temperature checks would be phased out in time to come.

Engineer Fong Chee Chun, 50, who was at the gym, said: "It's not very difficult to take our temperature. It feels safer to check everyone before they enter because we share the equipment."

At hospitals, visits to wards were allowed to resume yesterday, but with vaccination-differentiated measures in place.

The need to enforce strict rules - such as limits on visitor numbers and duration of visits, mask wearing and safe distancing - led to bottlenecks at a few hospitals.

At Singapore General Hospital (SGH), some visitors queued for an hour during the visiting hours from noon to 2pm. More than 50 people were in line to register for their visits, said Ms Janet Tan, 40, a clerk.

Her father, who has a skin infection, was relieved to see his family again, said Ms Tan. "I will have to plan to go earlier than the visiting hours to queue. Luckily, my dad knows how to video-call, so we call him every day to talk to him."

Ms Zin, 28, who goes by one name, queued for 50 minutes to visit her mother, who had an operation in the morning. "It was a very long wait and some people were angry and scolding the staff here," said the designer.

Ms Basyirah Begum, 30, said staff were overwhelmed at the SGH block she was at as they faced a queue of about 100 visitors waiting to register.

She said some people were confused about having to queue to submit a registration form when they had already pre-registered and declared their vaccination status.

"There were only three staff here. I saw a lot of frustrated people and it was a very stressful environment," said Ms Begum, who works in sales and was there to visit her grandmother.

While crowds at Khoo Teck Puat Hospital were thinner, a staff member who did not want to be named said there was a steady stream of visitors during visiting hours.

Freelance worker Angely Thong, 37, said she was at the hospital 30 minutes before visiting hours and did not have to wait long.

"Normally, every time restrictions are lifted, there'll be more people in the afternoon. That's what I predicted, so I came in the evening," she said. She was there to visit her husband.

Visitors who are fully vaccinated, or have recovered from Covid-19 and have a valid pre-event Covid-19 test exemption notice, can enter wards without a pre-visit test.

Unvaccinated visitors must show a negative Covid-19 test result to enter hospital wards. This can be an antigen rapid test or polymerase chain reaction test done within the past 24 hours.

A spokesman for the National University Health System (NUHS) said that visitor management policy and guidelines have been updated in line with the Ministry of Health's guidelines.

This is to protect patients, accompanying persons and caregivers, and to reduce the risk of Covid-19 transmission in hospitals, he said.

NUHS oversees the National University Hospital, Ng Teng Fong General Hospital, Jurong Community Hospital and Alexandra Hospital.

Meanwhile, attractions such as the Singapore Zoo, Jurong Bird Park, River Safari and Night Safari have also made adjustments to comply with the latest guidelines.

Wildlife Reserves Singapore, which manages the four parks, said in a post on its website that group sizes are capped at five, with unvaccinated people encouraged to stay in groups of up to two.

Shows at its parks will admit up to 50 guests, with a maximum of five people seated together, including infants, it said.