Speaking to the nation on 31 May by Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong on the topic of COVID-19 ‘New Normal’ for Singaporeans to live with the coronavirus, he asked everyone to get vaccinated so that Singapore can achieve herd immunity.
“Today, nearly 4 in 10 residents have had at least one dose of the vaccine. Our next target is to get two-thirds of residents vaccinated with at least the first dose. With our accelerated vaccination programme, we should be able to do this by early July,” he said at the time.
“Whether you are old or young, please come forward to be vaccinated once it is your turn. With the more infectious virus strains, we need as many people as possible to be vaccinated, in order to reach herd immunity, or get close to it. This is the way to make everyone safe and resume more normal activities.”
In fact, as of 14 Aug, approximately three-quarters of Singapore’s population had already been fully vaccinated.
Can’t reach herd immunity
Then yesterday (19 Aug), at the virtual multi-ministry taskforce conference, Minister Lawrence Wong sprang a surprise saying that Singapore will not reach herd immunity in this Covid-19 pandemic even with very high vaccination rates.
“The path towards being a COVID resilient nation is going to be a long and hard slog. Even with very high vaccination rates, we are not going to reach herd immunity, where the outbreak just fizzles out,” he warned.
Instead, Singapore must be mentally prepared that cases will rise as Singapore resumes activities and reopens its economy in a controlled manner, he said.
“We are feeling the stones as we cross the river.”
He added that Singapore’s overall aim is to move towards the end of the pandemic with “minimum death and damage”.
Singapore has also started to introduce vaccinated travel lanes (VTL) with Germany and Brunei next month as a “starting point”. It will allow arriving travellers to do away with serving a stay-home notice (SHN) period.
“We are starting with two countries, with designated flights and a set of essential safeguards,” said Transport Minister S Iswaran, also speaking at the virtual conference yesterday.
In addition, Singapore will unilaterally open its borders to travellers from Hong Kong and Macau with immediate effect, without the need for them to undergo SHN upon arrival in Singapore.
