Unvaccinated 69-year-old man dies; pre-school among three new clusters

A 69-year-old Singaporean died from complications due to Covid-19 yesterday.

The man, who was not vaccinated, developed symptoms on July 28. He was admitted to Tan Tock Seng Hospital the next day, and tested positive for the coronavirus, the Ministry of Health (MOH) said yesterday in its daily update.

He had a history of stroke, diabetes mellitus, hypertension and high cholesterol.

This brings the total number of Covid-19 deaths in Singapore to 43.

Three new clusters were also announced by MOH.

One is at Superland pre-school in Kreta Ayer Community Centre, with four cases linked to it.

The other two clusters are linked to two cases, and have a total of nine infections linked to them.

A total of 63 new cases were announced yesterday. Two of these were imported, while the other 61 were locally transmitted.

Of the locally transmitted cases, 17 are currently unlinked.

Overall, the number of new cases in the community has fallen from 758 cases in the week before last week, to 448 cases in the past week.

The number of unlinked cases in the community has also fallen from 227 cases in the week be-fore last week, to 129 cases in the past week.​

8 Number of people in critical condition in the intensive care unit, down from 11 cases on Tuesday.

Currently, 508 cases are warded in hospital. There are 35 cases of serious illness requiring oxygen supplementation, and eight people are in critical condition in the intensive care unit (ICU).

This is a drop from 11 cases in the ICU on Tuesday. Of the 43 cases, seven are fully vaccinated.

Of those who have fallen very ill, 36 are seniors above 60, of whom 29 are completely unvaccinated or partially vaccinated.

MOH said: "There is continuing evidence that almost all fully vaccinated individuals do not suffer serious disease when infected, unless they had underlying medical conditions that made them more susceptible."

It added that over the last 28 days, 8.7 per cent of those who are unvaccinated became severely ill or died, while the proportion of those fully vaccinated in this category is 0.9 per cent.

As at Tuesday, a total of 8,193,151 doses of Covid-19 vaccines have been administered under the national vaccination programme, covering 4,383,631 individuals, with 3,936,162 people having completed the full vaccination regimen.

In addition, 138,879 doses of other vaccines recognised in the World Health Organisation's Emergency Use Listing have been administered as at Aug 10, covering 82,406 individuals.

In total, 72 per cent of people in Singapore have received two doses of the vaccines, and 81 per cent have received at least one dose.