By The Ministry of Health (MOH) stated that as of 12 pm on 8 September, another 9 new cases of locally transmitted Zika virus infection was confirmed, which brought the number to 292 cases.
Among these cases four cases are linked to the Aljunied Crescent/ Sims Drive/ Kallang Way/ Paya Lebar Way cluster, one case is linked to the Bishan Street 12 cluster, and one case is linked to the Elite Terrace cluster.
MOH also reported that a potential new cluster involving two previously reported cases and a new case today was found. One of the previously unlinked cases in the cluster was reported on 7 September and his work address was verified today. They all work in the Ubi Crescent area.
While the other two cases have no known links to any existing cluster.
Earlier on last Saturday. MOH announced that the National Public Health Laboratory and A*STAR’s Bioinformatics Institute has completed the sequencing analysis of the Zika virus found in two patients from the Aljunied Crescent/ Sims Drive cluster. The analysis found that the virus belongs to the Asian lineage and likely evolved from the strain that was already circulating in Southeast Asia. MOH states that the virus from these two patients was not imported from South America and more details will be released by the research team shortly.
The National Environment Agency (NEA) said that the vector control is the key to control the disease, systematic and holistic approach through surveillance, prevention and control, outbreak management and outreach to arrest mosquito borne transmission in Singapore. Its objective is to keep mosquito-borne disease incidence low through reducing the mosquito population and breaking the disease transmission chain.
It stated that the vector control operations and outreach efforts in the cluster areas at Aljunied Crescent / Sims Drive / Paya Lebar Way / Kallang Way / Circuit Road / Geylang East Central / Geylang East Avenue 1; Bedok North Avenue 2 / Bedok North Avenue 3 / Bedok North Street 3; Joo Seng Road; Bishan Street 12 and Elite Terrace are ongoing. A total of 166 breeding habitats have been found and destroyed in the cluster areas, of which 108 are from homes, and 58 from outdoor areas, as of 7 September 2016.
NEA said that it will also be carrying out vector control operations and outreach efforts at Ubi Crescent.
Members of the public can obtain updated information on Zika and details on current clusters at NEA’s website: www.nea.gov.sg/zika andwww.nea.gov.sg/zika-clusters.