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SINGAPORE – Tackling the Covid-19 pandemic has been a major challenge despite Singapore’s experience with the Sars outbreak, said Senior Minister and Coordinating Minister for National Security Teo Chee Hean.
As the disease is far more infectious than the severe acute respiratory syndrome (Sars), heightened surveillance and tightened precautions in migrant worker dormitories early on proved to be insufficient, he added.
Even so, Singapore has managed to “orientate, adapt and act rapidly” to each wave of the virus, said Mr Teo, who is advising the multi-ministry task force on handling the Covid-19 outbreak in foreign worker dormitories.
Speaking in a national TV broadcast on Thursday, he said: “The crisis has stretched our resources and capacity… Each wave required us to develop and deploy novel measures to slow down the spread, and contain it.”
Sars in 2003 infected 238 people and killed 33 people in Singapore. Globally, there were 8,096 cases and 774 deaths.
Mr Teo’s speech – the third in an ongoing series of TV broadcasts by six ministers – focused on Singapore’s post-coronavirus future.
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