SINGAPORE, Dec 8 : Covid-19 infections and hospitalisations are increasing and putting a strain on hospitals in Singapore, the Ministry of Health warned on Friday.
Though the health ministry has raised the alert, it has also reassured people that the numbers are not as high as during the pandemic and that the circulating variants are not known to cause more severe illness.
In the week ended on December 2, as many as 32,035 people were diagnosed with COVID-19 – the highest number of infections recorded this year, according to a report by The Straits Times newspaper.
The previous high was 28,410 infections a week in March, the Ministry of Health (MOH) said.
The latest number is almost 10,000 more than the 22,094 diagnosed the previous week. The number of weekly infections has been hovering around 15,000 infections over the past two to three months.
The number of people being hospitalised and needing intensive care treatment has also gone up, it said.
An MOH statement on December 8 said the average daily COVID-19 hospitalisations rose to 225 from 136 the week before, and the average daily intensive care unit (ICU) cases increased to four compared with one case in the previous week.
It said: “This has added workload to our hospitals, which are already busy.”
Nine people severely ill with Covid-19 were admitted to a hospital in ICU in the week of November 26 to December 2, up from four the previous week.
But as hospitalisation and the need for intensive care treatment usually lag behind infections, the numbers could go up in the coming weeks, it said.
During the COVID-19 wave in March and April 2023, ICU weekly admissions for this infection hit a high of 16 about three weeks after infections peaked, according to the report.
The wave resulted in 54 Covid-19 deaths in April and 53 in March.
The ministry said the rise in cases “could be due to several factors, including waning population immunity and increased travel and community interactions during the year-end travel and festive season”.
The ministry urged people to keep up to date with their COVID-19 vaccinations, especially seniors and those who are medically vulnerable.
Infected people should exercise social responsibility and stay home if unwell. They should also wear a mask in crowded, not well-ventilated places, it said.
It also asked people “to seek medical treatment at a hospital’s emergency department only for serious or life-threatening emergencies”.
This is to “preserve our hospital capacity for patients who truly need acute hospital care and allow those with severe illness to receive timely treatment,” the ministry statement said. (PTI)
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