US changes travel advisory for Singapore to 'high' level of Covid-19 from 'unknown'

Under the US CDC's updated advisory, people should ensure that they are fully vaccinated before travelling to Singapore. PHOTO: ST FILE

WASHINGTON (BLOOMBERG) - The US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Monday (Jan 10) reclassified Singapore as having a high level of Covid-19 in its travel advisory for the Republic.

The United States has four levels of travel advisories for the coronavirus: Level 1 (Low), Level 2 (Moderate), Level 3 (High) and Level 4 (Very High), excluding Level Unknown.

Under Level 3 - the US' updated status for Singapore - people should ensure that they are fully vaccinated before travelling to the destinations listed. Unvaccinated travellers are advised to avoid non-essential travel to those destinations.

In contrast, when a destination's Covid-19 situation is labelled as unknown, people are advised to avoid travel to those places. When travel to those destinations is a must, people should make sure that they are fully vaccinated before travelling.

The update for Singapore came less than a week after the CDC declared that the level of Covid-19 in a country that publishes detailed data every day was unknown.

The CDC raised eyebrows on Jan 4 when it classified Singapore's Covid-19 situation as "Unknown" from "Very High" because of a lack of testing data updates for the country on third-party platform Our World in Data since Nov 8 last year.

The move was met with confusion in Singapore, which contacted the CDC and the US Embassy in the Republic to offer the needed data.

Singapore maintains stricter testing and social distancing measures than the US.

The CDC said last week it would update its advisory after working with Singaporean authorities for the Covid-19 testing data.

Join ST's WhatsApp Channel and get the latest news and must-reads.