Singapore – With slightly more than one-third of the population receiving at least one dose of a Covid-19 vaccine, Singapore ranks among the top 25 countries globally in terms of Covid-19 vaccination.
Amid supply constraints, Singapore ranks high in vaccination roll-out, said Associate Professor Hsu Li Yang, vice-dean of global health at the National University of Singapore’s Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health, in a Straits Times report on Thursday (May 27).
As of May 24, about 3.73 million doses have been given — 1.62 million fully vaccinated and 2.1 million receiving at least one dose of a Covid-19 vaccine. About 28.3 per cent of the population is fully vaccinated, according to ourworldindata.org, which tracks the statistics of Covid-19 vaccinations globally.
Singapore is currently lagging behind countries such as the United States, United Kingdom and Israel, with 39.9, 35.4 and 56.6 per cent of their populations already fully vaccinated, respectively.
Assoc Prof Hsu noted that the vaccination pace should speed up once there are “adequate continuous supplies” of approved vaccines.
Professor Dale Fisher, a senior consultant in infectious diseases at the National University Hospital, added, “Every country would love to be vaccinating faster, but obviously, globally, demand outstrips supply.”
He said that with Singapore’s steady supply of vaccines, all long-term residents would have the opportunity of being vaccinated in the next few months.
Meanwhile, the president of the Asia-Pacific Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infection, Professor Paul Tambyah, said, “Ideally, we should have vaccinated more people by now – perhaps at the level of other small high-income countries such as Israel or the United Arab Emirates.”
He noted that although vaccine distribution is “fairly efficient”, the primary constraint lies in supply.
“The vaccines have proved effective in reducing the current wave of infections, but it is possible that we would have had even fewer cases if we had a higher rate of vaccination,” he said.
According to the wife of Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong and chief executive of Temasek Holdings, Mdm Ho Ching, Singapore’s vaccine supply experienced “various hiccups”.
The Government “has announced the vaccination will open in early June for those under 45 years old”, wrote Mdm Ho. “I believe this is based on the expected vaccine delivery in April or May,” she wrote in a Facebook post on May 9. /TISG
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