Instead of the Virus Vanguard, why not ask Singa the Courtesy Lion to come out of retirement?

Amid reports that the artist behind the controversial “Virus Vanguard” has apologised and stepped down from his position, over any offence caused, many have took to the internet to express support for him as an individual. He was hired to do a job.
Why is there a need for him to apologise for doing his job? Shouldn’t it be the people behind the employment who should be sorry? They created a superfluous job and that is where the inquiry should begin and end. The question is why there was a need to spend resources to create new comic characters to help combat a globally known virus and not why the artist who was hired to do a job did his job.
Singapore has had a whole host of mascots since its independence.
Who would forget Singa the Courtesy Lion or Sharity the Elephant?

If mascots are deemed needed in the first place, why not just revive these old and familiar names instead of reinventing the wheel?
Surely Singa the Courtesy Lion is more than capable of encouraging the public to wear their masks and wash their hands? Sharity the Elephant is equally up for the job of encouraging the general acts of kindness and consideration that social distancing entails.
Using what we already have would have avoided all of this controversy to begin with. Why spend money, time and resources to create new and unfamiliar characters which will then have to be marketed anew when Singa and Sharity can easily come out of retirement? I am sure they won’t mind coming out of retirement to help us out!
There is no doubting that the creation of the “Virus Vanguard” was paved with good intentions. But there seems to very little thought that goes into auditing what we already have. Shouldn’t there be more controls over the budgets of such projects?
The corona virus, being a global pandemic is one that has received international coverage. It doesn’t need any more publicity. We are already inundated with what to do and what not to do by every single news outlet there is.
Creating more characters at this point will simply generate more noise and add to confusion.
Does this go deeper into the Singaporean mindset of always demolishing the old to create new things mindlessly without even sparing a thought for whether or not we even need it?
From our buildings to our green spaces, we are incessantly tearing down. Have we ever asked ourselves why?