All 12 new COVID cases in Singapore asymptomatic, including 4 imported

SINGAPORE — The Ministry of Health (MOH) confirmed 12 new cases in Singapore as of Wednesday (23 September) afternoon, bringing the country’s total to 57,639.

All new cases today are asymptomatic and were proactively detected, said the MOH.

Of them, a work permit holder is classified as a case in the community who had been identified as a contact of a previously confirmed case and had been earlier placed on quarantine as well as tested while quarantined. He is one of the 191 cases linked to the cluster at the Kenyon/UBS construction site.

Four are imported cases, of which three are permanent residents arriving from India. Seven remaining cases are foreign workers residing in dormitories, of which four had been identified earlier as contacts of previous cases and had already been quarantined.

Overall, eight per cent of the new cases have no established links.

The MOH said the number of new cases in the community has remained stable at an average of one per day in the past two weeks. Similarly, it added that the number of unlinked cases in the community has also remained stable at an average of fewer than one case per day in the past two weeks.

Amongst the four imported cases, the three PRs had returned to Singapore from India on 11 September.

The remaining case is a work pass holder currently employed here who arrived from Iran on 11 September.

All of them had been placed on the 14-day stay-home notice upon their arrival here and were tested while serving their notice at dedicated facilities, said the MOH.

3 cases in dorms detected via surveillance testing

Amongst the seven cases residing in dorms, four had been identified earlier as contacts of previous cases, and were tested during quarantine, said the MOH.

The remaining three cases were detected through surveillance testing, such as the bi-weekly rostered routine testing of workers living in dorms.

As of last Friday, about 5,700 workers who are required to undergo the routine testing have yet to do so, said the Ministry of Manpower, Economic Development Board, Building and Construction Authority, and Health Promotion Board in a joint statement on the same day.

“This is a significant reduction from the 13,000 workers from last week, and we would like to thank employers for their cooperation,” the authorities had said.

Of Singapore’s COVID-19 tally, 54,360 – or 94.3 per cent – are foreign workers living in dorms.

99% of total cases have recovered

With 29 more patients discharged from hospitals or community isolation facilities on Wednesday, 57,291 cases – or 99.4 per cent of the total – have fully recovered from the infection.

Most of the 36 hospitalised cases are stable or improving, while none is in critical condition in the intensive care unit.

A total of 285 patients with mild symptoms or are clinically well but still test positive are isolated and cared for at community facilities.

Apart from 27 patients who have died from COVID-19 complications, 15 others who tested positive for the virus were determined to have died from unrelated causes, including three whose deaths were attributed to a heart attack and another four, whose deaths were attributed to coronary heart disease.

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