As the circuit breaker is being set to end on 1 June, the restrictions and precautionary measures are also expected to be lifted.
During the COVID-19 multi-ministry task force press conference yesterday (12 May), Health Minister Gan Kim Yong reported that the number of new cases in the community managed to drop from an average of more than 30 cases daily in late-April to eight new cases a day in the past week.
In an official statement released by the Ministry of Health (MOH) yesterday, it was stated that the task force had “substantially” reduced the number of COVID-19 infections in the community, as well as “stabilised” the infections at migrant workers’ dormitories.
“The number of new daily community cases are at its lowest since mid-March, and more migrant workers are recovering. The Taskforce has also implemented plans for a systemic clearance of migrant worker dormitories, to ensure that migrant workers are well and can safely resume work when their sectors gradually re-open after the end of the circuit breaker period.”
According to the statement, since Singapore is seeing lower numbers in the community cases daily, the task force is ready to gradually ease the circuit breaker restrictions so that the people can resume normal activities safely.
However, the easing of the circuit breaker would only deem possible with the plans and enablers came up by the task force. The Ministry listed plans such as testing the migrant workers, clearing dormitories, ramping up Singapore’s testing capacity, as well as strengthening the contact tracing abilities.
Despite the plans of easing circuit breaker measures, Mr Gan cautioned against complacency even if the daily new cases in the community remain low, as reported by CNA.
“As we gradually lift the circuit breaker measures, there is a risk that the community cases may rise again. This has been the experience of many countries which have seen a second wave of infections after relaxing their social distancing measures.”
He added that Singapore has to “very careful” to reduce the risk of an increase in new cases within the community. This implies that complacency may create new large clusters in the community which will further strain the existing crisis response against COVID-19.
“Singapore has to remain “very careful, remain vigilant and minimise the risk of any sharp rise in cases, or large clusters in the community.”
To prevent people from being too excited about the end of circuit breaker in about two more weeks, Mr Gan explained that we are not to expect things to return to “normalcy” and “celebrate”.
He had also stated that measures like safe distancing and safe management at the workplace are expected to resume even when the authorities progressively lift some of the tighter measures.
