Coronavirus: Singapore
Temasek to distribute surgical and N95 masks to households
Delta variant more contagious, so more effective masks needed to bring down cases: Ho Ching
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Masked commuters at HarbourFront station yesterday. Temasek Foundation is working with CapitaLand malls and supermarkets to distribute the masks, which households can collect by presenting their utility bills. Each household will get 50 medical-grade surgical masks and 25 N95 respirator masks.
ST PHOTO: JASON QUAH
Another mask distribution exercise is to start in a few weeks. This time, Temasek Foundation will hand out free surgical and N95 masks.
The Delta variant is twice as contagious as the coronavirus variants that caused Covid-19 last year, and will require Singapore residents to wear more effective masks to bring down infection numbers, Temasek chief executive Ho Ching said in a Facebook post yesterday.
Noting that each case can infect five to six people, she said that 80 per cent of the population needs to wear "80 per cent-effective masks or better" to curb the spread.
To facilitate this, Temasek Foundation is working with CapitaLand malls and larger supermarkets to distribute the masks, which households can collect by presenting their SP Group utility bills, she said.
Under the new exercise, each household will receive 50 medical-grade surgical masks and 25 N95 respirator masks.
The exercise, originally scheduled to start after National Day, has been pushed back to give participating organisations more time to test the system, Ms Ho said.
Temasek Foundation said the exercise will begin at the end of this month or early next month.
It also said there was no distribution exercise yesterday, after a photo of a banner on the giving out of masks made its rounds online.
Only a trial of the collection exercise that is not open to the public began yesterday.
Ms Ho said: "As the boxes of masks are much bigger than the little oximeters, the pharmacies do not have enough space to cater for mass collection. Hence, the pharmacies are not part of this coming collection exercise for (two or three) boxes of masks."
Pharmacies were involved when oximeters were given out to households from July 5.
Explaining the reason for giving out medical-grade surgical masks, Ms Ho said that they had 95 per cent filtration efficiency or better. She added that N95 masks are worn for high-risk jobs such as looking after Covid-19 patients or doing mass swabbing exercises.
In comparison, reusable double-layered masks as well as many of the pleated disposable masks can offer protection of about only 80 per cent.
Ms Ho said: "With the medical-grade surgical and N95 masks... we have an additional option for better protection."
She also said that a medical-grade surgical mask should be worn by those with flu-like symptoms or on visits to a hospital or nursing home. N95 masks are meant to be used if a person has tested positive on an antigen rapid test kit.
Household representatives are encouraged to reduce plastic waste by taking their own bags to hold the boxes of masks when the collection exercise begins.
