Health Minister Ong Ye Kung said on Tuesday (June 28) that the next Covid-19 wave has arrived in Singapore. However, he added that he does not believe this new Singapore Covid 19 wave will be worse than the wave of infections that struck in February due to the BA.2 Omicron subvariant.
Mr Ong had said on June 2 at the Ministry of Health’s (MOH) annual Work Plan Seminar that the next wave of Covid-19 infections may arrive in a “matter of months.” More specifically, this could be by July or August.
And in a TikTok video on June 20 he said again, “In the next one or two months, we expect a new Omicron wave, but not to worry, with vaccination, we can all be safe.”
But it seems that the new Singapore Covid 19 wave arrived earlier than expected, possibly because many people had gone abroad for their holidays, he told Lianhe Zaobao after the 30th annual general meeting of the Chinese Development Assistance Council (CDAC).
On Tuesday, MOH reported 11,504 new Covid-19 infections, the highest daily count since March 22, and double the number of the 5,309 cases reported on Monday.
In comparison, the number of new cases reported last Tuesday (June 21) was 7,109, which was also double the previous number recorded the day before, 3,220.
“I had earlier said that the next wave might take place around July or August, but it’s now here a little earlier, at the end of June – possibly due to the June holidays,” the Health Minister told Lianhe Zaobao.
Last week, the MOH said that the increase in community cases was mainly due to the BA.4 and BA.5 Omicron subvariants, although the majority of the country’s cases are due to the BA.2 subvariant.
On Monday, the ministry noted that around 45 per cent of the cases in the past week are due to the subvariants. The BA.5 subvariant is believed to be responsible for 40 per cent of recent cases.
These variants are also driving an increase in cases in other parts of the world, including Europe and the United States. /TISG