Singapore — Businessman and former Nominated Member of Parliament Calvin Cheng took to social media calling for a reversion to the rule of five for vaccinated individuals in Singapore.
“Revert to vaccinated rule of five in Singapore immediately… We are being left behind behaving like tortoises,” said Mr Cheng in a Facebook post on Sunday (Oct 24).
He highlighted multiple reasons why certain restrictions can be lifted to vaccinated individuals.
“The current wave, which is tapering off, happened before we locked out the unvaccinated from malls and all food and beverage (establishments),” said Mr Cheng.
He noted that while unvaccinated individuals take up six per cent of the population, they comprise 60 per cent of ICU cases.
“We are the only developed country with high vaccination rates and harsh domestic restrictions. Even parts of Australia have opened up to large groups of vaccinated people,” said Mr Cheng.
“Singapore is a global city that needs to attract global talent and visitors. Anybody who has visited other developed countries will know that we are being left behind.”
Touching on other effects of restrictions, Mr Cheng noted that the population would suffer from psychological issues the longer this goes on.
He called for the government to meet current challenges by targeting the group “that is causing problems disproportionately,” namely the unvaccinated.
Mr Cheng added, “If we have a risk-averse mindset, there will always be a new reason to keep things restricted.”
He suggested allowing vaccinated people to gather in groups of 5, 8 or 10.
Instead of listing to “timid, risk-averse individuals,” the government needs to open up to the vaccinated, he said.
“At the same time, have the guts to either mandate vaccines for seniors, or place strict stay-home orders for the unvaccinated, to avoid them disproportionately stressing our healthcare system.”
At the end of his post, Mr Cheng said, “All this nonsense about waiting a few more months needs to stop.”
On Saturday (Oct 23), Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said in an update to the country’s Covid-19 situation that “We can neither lockdown indefinitely and stand still, nor can we simply let go and let things rip.”
Citing the multi-ministry task force for Covid-19, Mr Lee announced that Covid-19 measures could be eased if the weekly infection growth rate drops below one.
The weekly infection growth rate is the ratio of community Covid-19 cases in the past week over the week before. If the ratio is greater than one, it indicates that cases are growing while less than one means declining cases.
“Many of you have written to express your frustrations about the restrictions, while others have voiced concerns that we are opening up too fast!” he highlighted.
On Oct 20, the Ministry of Health announced that Covid-19 restrictions would be extended to Nov 21.
Under the restrictions, social gatherings are capped to a maximum of two people, and work-from-home is still the default.
Those allowed to dine in at food and beverage establishments are limited to a maximum of two vaccinated individuals. /TISG