Highly vaccinated Singapore sets a worrying example
SINGAPORE – With 84% of Singaporeans fully vaccinated against Covid-19, one of the highest percentages worldwide, many had expected authorities would by now be easing, not maintaining, social distancing and other contagion-curbing restrictions.
But that’s exactly what officials are doing as the island nation seeks to cope with its largest outbreaks since the start of the pandemic.
Singapore’s Ministry of Health (MoH) announced on Wednesday (October 20) that stricter curbs introduced in late September as part of a so-called “stabilization phase” implemented to minimize health care system strains would be extended for another month as daily cases have soared to all-time highs.
As other nations begin pursuing reopening strategies and treating the coronavirus as endemic, Singapore’s experience is now being looked upon as a sobering case study, particularly for countries that have until now kept cases low by relying on strict measures but are under mounting pressure to manage, rather than eradicate, Covid-19.
Singapore’s daily cases hit a record 3,994 on October 19, with the seven-day average number of new infections more than tripling in the last month. The overall death toll has more than quadrupled over the same period, rising to 280 on October 21 from just 65. Authorities, meanwhile, have attested to rising pressure on hospitals and healthcare workers.
“At the current situation, we face considerable risk of the healthcare system being overwhelmed,” said Lawrence Wong, Singapore’s finance minister and co-chair of a multi-ministry Covid-19 task force. “It’s not simply a matter of having extra beds or purchasing new equipment… our medical personnel are stretched and fatigued.”
As of Wednesday, about 89% of isolation beds and 67% of intensive care unit (ICU) beds, including those for non-Covid-19 patients, were filled in public hospitals, according to the MoH. That is despite only around 1% of cases requiring oxygen supplementation and 0.1% requiring ICU care over the last 28 days, with 98.6% of cases showing mild or no symptoms.
Around 10% of infected patients are being admitted to hospitals due to more severe symptoms or co-morbidities, with around 100 unvaccinated seniors per day. A substantial number of seniors have forgone vaccination for various reasons despite being given priority access to Covid-19 vaccines ahead of other demographic groups in February.
A large proportion of severe outcomes and coronavirus deaths have since been linked to unvaccinated seniors, who are proving to be the Achilles’ heel of the city-state’s pandemic response. Unvaccinated patients made up 54.7% of 495 severe cases recorded in recent days, with others being vaccinated but with co-morbidities, said the MoH earlier this week.
At a press conference on Wednesday, Health Minister Ong Ye Kung told media that queues for beds for both Covid-19 and non-Covid patients have formed at certain hospitals, and that the MoH would open up more ICU beds if necessary, although that will be “at the expense of further degradation of normal service and normal medical care.”
Since the “stabilization phase” began on September 27, the number of new infections appears to be plateauing, though there is no sign that cases are falling. Social gatherings were capped to a maximum of two while work-from-home has become the city-state’s default arrangement. Those measures will be reviewed after two weeks but will otherwise remain in place until November 21.
Businesses and retailers have lamented the latest month-long extension of Covid-19 restrictions, the latest in successive rounds of rule-tightening since May that have left affected sectors reeling. A support package for businesses and workers worth S$640 million (US$475 million) was announced in the wake of the extended restrictions.
Food and beverage (F&B) businesses across Singapore have been among the hardest hit by start-stop measures to reduce transmission, and industry groups have appealed to the government for greater leniency. Taskforce co-chair Wong maintains that it is still “too risky” to allow five people from the same household to publicly dine in together.
At the same time, the city-state began welcoming quarantine-free entry to vaccinated travelers from the United States and some European nations this week, arguably exposing Singapore to greater risk than permitting fully vaccinated residents to patronize restaurants in higher numbers in accordance with past pledges for more freedoms for the immunized.
With policymakers previously holding up a high vaccination rate as the key prerequisite for a phased reopening, public sentiment has been divided over the stuttering pace of plans to “live with Covid.” As frustrations rise with what is seen as an overly cautious approach, some experts are have questioned the use of blanket restrictions amid rising endemicity.
Paul Tambyah, president of the Asia Pacific Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infection, says the current rate of transmission in Singapore has illustrated the limits of broad non-pharmaceutical interventions. “There is no good evidence that the measures put in for the ‘stabilization phase’ have had an impact on case numbers or on ICU utilization rates,” Tambyah said.
“There is a need to target the vulnerable to concentrate resources and avoid unintended consequences of blanket restrictions,” he added.
Tambyah has said that he does not think loosening the restrictions to the previous set of measures in place earlier this year, in which the maximum group size for public gatherings was five, would lead to a surge in infections.
Tambyah is also chairman of the opposition Singapore Democratic Party (SDP), which last month published an eight-point plan detailing how Singapore can more effectively deal with and exit the Covid-19 pandemic. The report criticized the government’s multi-ministerial task force as being “plagued with a distinct lack of coherence and direction.”
“The reactive nature of the multi-ministerial task force’s approach in dealing with outbreaks of infections has led to stop-start, on-again/off-again policies, which had impacted adversely on both employers and employees [and has] left Singaporeans confused and frustrated,” said the SDP’s healthcare panel, which authored the alternative strategy.
Tambyah told Asia Times that the SDP’s suggestions would be submitted to the task force pending public feedback.
“Basically, we would stop testing asymptomatic individuals, have a dedicated ambulance hotline for those who need oxygen, empower the general practitioners to make clinical decisions on hospitalization and other practical suggestions.”
With the coronavirus “already endemic almost all over the world,” the disease expert said non-pharmaceutical interventions such as strict caps on gatherings of vaccinated individuals and differentiated measures for the vaccinated and unvaccinated “would not have a significant impact on the transmission at this stage in the pandemic.”
Singapore introduced so-called “vaccination-differentiated safe management measures” at restaurants in August, with only fully vaccinated people allowed to dine in. Last week, it extended those rules to prohibit unvaccinated people from dining in at open-air hawker centers or even entering shopping centers, with some exceptions.
“The disease is all over Singapore right now and the priority should be reaching out to the unvaccinated seniors and protecting the vulnerable rather than taking measures which adversely affect the bulk of the population with little benefit,” Tambyah maintains, saying he hopes ongoing restrictions “will be lifted in a month or earlier.”
Health Minister Ong told reporters on Wednesday that the current wave of infections will not last “indefinitely” and will peak at some point in a “new equilibrium with the virus” as the population builds up better immunity and more people receive booster shots, which have recently been made available to people aged 30 years and older.
“Hopefully this [new equilibrium] will come in the next few months. There may not be a peak but a plateau followed by a downturn. It is very hard to tell,” said Tambyah. “The aim is to reach a low level of endemicity, like the Zika virus, which appears in Singapore every now and again with a few imported cases and a handful of local cases every year.”
They Had the Vaccines and a Plan to Reopen. Instead They Got Cold Feet.
The vaccines were supposed to be the ticket out of the pandemic. But in Singapore, things did not go according to plan.
The Southeast Asian city-state was widely considered a success story in its initial handling of the coronavirus. It closed its borders, tested and traced aggressively and was one of the first countries in Asia to order vaccines.
A top politician told the public that an 80 percent vaccination rate was the criterion for a phased reopening. Singapore has now fully inoculated 83 percent of its population, but instead of opening up, it is doing the opposite.
In September, with cases doubling every eight to 10 days, the government reinstated restrictions on gatherings. The United States said its citizens should reconsider travel to the country. Long lines started forming at the emergency departments in several hospitals. People were told once again they should work from home.
The country’s experience has become a sobering case study for other nations pursuing reopening strategies without first having had to deal with large outbreaks in the pandemic. For the Singapore residents who believed the city-state would reopen once the vaccination rate reached a certain level, there was a feeling of whiplash and nagging questions about what it would take to reopen if vaccines were not enough.
Singapore virus debate sowing rare disquiet in ruling party
Senior members of Singapore’s ruling People’s Action Party are concerned that mixed signals from the country’s virus task force are giving the appearance of divisions that could lead to rare infighting, people familiar with the situation said.
The party cadres, who decide which individuals are admitted to the PAP’s top decision making body, were concerned perceptions of a split could spur members to choose sides in the informal contest to succeed Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, whose plans to step aside were delayed amid the pandemic after his heir-apparent bowed out earlier this year. They said the prime minister or another senior member should take charge and show decisiveness, according to the people.
Lee’s disrupted succession plan — unusual in a country used to orderly transitions — has added more pressure on the PAP as it looks to keep the economy on track while dealing with rising concerns about foreign workers in the financial hub. Although the party prolonged its nearly six-decade rule in an election last year, the opposition gained a record number of seats.
While the virus task force and Lee’s cabinet make key decisions and implement them as a team, Finance Minister Lawrence Wong and Health Minister Ong Ye Kung have noticeably focused on different aspects of the pandemic response in recent public comments as the country announced stop-start changes in its reopening plan. Wong has generally appeared to favour tighter measures to contain the virus, while Ong is seen as a greater advocate for opening. Both are regarded as prime contenders to one day take power from Lee.
The disquiet in the party reflects a broader debate within Singapore society about the pace of opening up, even as it boasts one of the world’s highest vaccination rates. The Southeast Asian financial hub has sought to balance the need to resume international travel and domestic activity with keeping overall mortality rate low, leading to abrupt shifts in policy on issues like working from home and dining out.
In an interview with Bloomberg TV on Monday, Wong denied any divisions, saying the task force carefully deliberates all decisions and “definitely” operates by consensus. He appeared to align more clearly with Ong, saying the country would continue to reopen even as officials looked to keep the caseload contained while augmenting hospital capacity to handle 5,000 daily new cases or more.
After targeting zero cases for most of the pandemic, Singapore has started to tolerate more. It saw 2,236 new cases on Tuesday, a new record tally.
“We do not take the trust that people have in the government for granted at all,” Wong said.
Ong, the Prime Minister’s Office and the PAP didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment on the perceived differences of opinion and whether Lee was considering changes to the virus task force.
“Having a clear leadership may work better — either Lee or his senior ministers should take charge,” Inderjit Singh, a former PAP lawmaker, said by phone.“The focus should be to tackle the pandemic and not a means to decide on selecting the future prime minister.”
One of the incidents that spurred confusion occurred earlier this month, when Wong told the press that Singapore shouldn’t rule out sweeping lockdown measures entirely amid rising infections. Those remarks appeared to contradict Ong, who was attendinga Group of 20 meeting of health ministers in Rome at the time. He had earliersaid he believed a so-called circuit breaker was “behind” Singapore.
Wong and Ong both rose to the fore as potential successors to Lee after his designated heir, Heng Swee Keat, shocked Singapore by stepping aside in April. At the time, Lee said the goal was to identify a successor among younger leaders before the next election due in 2025.
As the main public face of Singapore’s virus response last year, Wong won plaudits for speaking clearly to reassure the public and acting decisively to stem a surge in infections in foreign worker dorms. When he became finance minister after Heng stepped aside, Ong became a co-chair as health minister and the team presided over a vaccination campaign that has now inoculated more than four in every five people — a feat that other developed nations have struggled to achieve.
Yet views between Wong and Ong appeared to diverge shortly after the task force drew up plans to reopen more when 80% of the population was vaccinated. In July, Ong said Singapore must find ways to live with the virus and it would not be “unusual at all” to have 200 cases or more per day.
But by Sept. 3, that resolve was tested with daily infections climbing higher than 200. Wong then made it clear the government would keep current rules and not make new opening moves. The government implemented more regular testing for some workers and expanded home recovery for Covid-19 patients to prevent hospitals from getting overwhelmed.
In the middle of the month, Ong called the jump in infections a “rite of passage” for nations that have resumed some semblance of normalcy. That stirred discontent, with more than 6,300 people signing a petition calling for Ong to resign. Others have taken to social media to voice their frustrations with home recovery arrangements and post satirical memes.
“For friends who know my phone numbers, they text me all the time and give me that feedback, but for every one of them I also get another one to say ‘why don’t we lock down,’” Ong said during a health summit in mid-September in response to a question on whether the government was being too cautious about reopening. “So, there is a range of risk appetites around Singapore.”
A survey by Milieu Insight found that 52% of Singaporeans felt the latest restrictions on social gatherings were “just right,” with 25% saying they were too strict and the rest calling them too lax, the Straits Times reported on Tuesday.
“The differences in approaches and tone have been magnified in large part because of the public awareness” that Wong and Ong are frontrunners to become prime minister, said Nydia Ngiow, Singapore-based senior director at BowerGroupAsia, a strategic policy advisory firm.
Such publicly divergent views would usually be unheard of for a party used to the strong-arm leadership of its founding father Lee Kuan Yew, according to Bilveer Singh, associate professor at the National University of Singapore’s department of political science.
“In the late 1970’s Lee Kuan Yew said, ‘give clear signals — don’t confuse people,” Singh said. “This is the master talking. Now, somehow or another, I think the PAP failed here.”
It was Pinky's plan all along to have them both at loggerheads whilst shielding CCS from the whole brouhaha by placing him in the education ministry; when the dust eventually settles and kee chiu emerges relatively unscathed with both OYK and LW severely bloodied, no prizes for guessing who ascends the throne.
Pinky gong simi lanjiao future? PAP has wrecked our future by letting three of its stooges run the sbow! Their constantly flipflopping "strategies" will be the eventual death of us all!
My confidence in the PAP had already waned considerably in the past decade, that said I continue to be astounded by the staggering incompetence of its 4G leaders laid increasingly bare by their severe mismanagement of the current pandemic with each passing day......
Highly vaccinated Singapore sets a worrying example
SINGAPORE – With 84% of Singaporeans fully vaccinated against Covid-19, one of the highest percentages worldwide, many had expected authorities would by now be easing, not maintaining, social distancing and other contagion-curbing restrictions.
But that’s exactly what officials are doing as the island nation seeks to cope with its largest outbreaks since the start of the pandemic.
Singapore’s Ministry of Health (MoH) announced on Wednesday (October 20) that stricter curbs introduced in late September as part of a so-called “stabilization phase” implemented to minimize health care system strains would be extended for another month as daily cases have soared to all-time highs.
As other nations begin pursuing reopening strategies and treating the coronavirus as endemic, Singapore’s experience is now being looked upon as a sobering case study, particularly for countries that have until now kept cases low by relying on strict measures but are under mounting pressure to manage, rather than eradicate, Covid-19.
Singapore’s daily cases hit a record 3,994 on October 19, with the seven-day average number of new infections more than tripling in the last month. The overall death toll has more than quadrupled over the same period, rising to 280 on October 21 from just 65. Authorities, meanwhile, have attested to rising pressure on hospitals and healthcare workers.
“At the current situation, we face considerable risk of the healthcare system being overwhelmed,” said Lawrence Wong, Singapore’s finance minister and co-chair of a multi-ministry Covid-19 task force. “It’s not simply a matter of having extra beds or purchasing new equipment… our medical personnel are stretched and fatigued.”
As of Wednesday, about 89% of isolation beds and 67% of intensive care unit (ICU) beds, including those for non-Covid-19 patients, were filled in public hospitals, according to the MoH. That is despite only around 1% of cases requiring oxygen supplementation and 0.1% requiring ICU care over the last 28 days, with 98.6% of cases showing mild or no symptoms.
Around 10% of infected patients are being admitted to hospitals due to more severe symptoms or co-morbidities, with around 100 unvaccinated seniors per day. A substantial number of seniors have forgone vaccination for various reasons despite being given priority access to Covid-19 vaccines ahead of other demographic groups in February.
A large proportion of severe outcomes and coronavirus deaths have since been linked to unvaccinated seniors, who are proving to be the Achilles’ heel of the city-state’s pandemic response. Unvaccinated patients made up 54.7% of 495 severe cases recorded in recent days, with others being vaccinated but with co-morbidities, said the MoH earlier this week.
At a press conference on Wednesday, Health Minister Ong Ye Kung told media that queues for beds for both Covid-19 and non-Covid patients have formed at certain hospitals, and that the MoH would open up more ICU beds if necessary, although that will be “at the expense of further degradation of normal service and normal medical care.”
Since the “stabilization phase” began on September 27, the number of new infections appears to be plateauing, though there is no sign that cases are falling. Social gatherings were capped to a maximum of two while work-from-home has become the city-state’s default arrangement. Those measures will be reviewed after two weeks but will otherwise remain in place until November 21.
Businesses and retailers have lamented the latest month-long extension of Covid-19 restrictions, the latest in successive rounds of rule-tightening since May that have left affected sectors reeling. A support package for businesses and workers worth S$640 million (US$475 million) was announced in the wake of the extended restrictions.
Food and beverage (F&B) businesses across Singapore have been among the hardest hit by start-stop measures to reduce transmission, and industry groups have appealed to the government for greater leniency. Taskforce co-chair Wong maintains that it is still “too risky” to allow five people from the same household to publicly dine in together.
At the same time, the city-state began welcoming quarantine-free entry to vaccinated travelers from the United States and some European nations this week, arguably exposing Singapore to greater risk than permitting fully vaccinated residents to patronize restaurants in higher numbers in accordance with past pledges for more freedoms for the immunized.
With policymakers previously holding up a high vaccination rate as the key prerequisite for a phased reopening, public sentiment has been divided over the stuttering pace of plans to “live with Covid.” As frustrations rise with what is seen as an overly cautious approach, some experts are have questioned the use of blanket restrictions amid rising endemicity.
Paul Tambyah, president of the Asia Pacific Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infection, says the current rate of transmission in Singapore has illustrated the limits of broad non-pharmaceutical interventions. “There is no good evidence that the measures put in for the ‘stabilization phase’ have had an impact on case numbers or on ICU utilization rates,” Tambyah said.
“There is a need to target the vulnerable to concentrate resources and avoid unintended consequences of blanket restrictions,” he added.
Tambyah has said that he does not think loosening the restrictions to the previous set of measures in place earlier this year, in which the maximum group size for public gatherings was five, would lead to a surge in infections.
Tambyah is also chairman of the opposition Singapore Democratic Party (SDP), which last month published an eight-point plan detailing how Singapore can more effectively deal with and exit the Covid-19 pandemic. The report criticized the government’s multi-ministerial task force as being “plagued with a distinct lack of coherence and direction.”
“The reactive nature of the multi-ministerial task force’s approach in dealing with outbreaks of infections has led to stop-start, on-again/off-again policies, which had impacted adversely on both employers and employees [and has] left Singaporeans confused and frustrated,” said the SDP’s healthcare panel, which authored the alternative strategy.
Tambyah told Asia Times that the SDP’s suggestions would be submitted to the task force pending public feedback.
“Basically, we would stop testing asymptomatic individuals, have a dedicated ambulance hotline for those who need oxygen, empower the general practitioners to make clinical decisions on hospitalization and other practical suggestions.”
With the coronavirus “already endemic almost all over the world,” the disease expert said non-pharmaceutical interventions such as strict caps on gatherings of vaccinated individuals and differentiated measures for the vaccinated and unvaccinated “would not have a significant impact on the transmission at this stage in the pandemic.”
Singapore introduced so-called “vaccination-differentiated safe management measures” at restaurants in August, with only fully vaccinated people allowed to dine in. Last week, it extended those rules to prohibit unvaccinated people from dining in at open-air hawker centers or even entering shopping centers, with some exceptions.
“The disease is all over Singapore right now and the priority should be reaching out to the unvaccinated seniors and protecting the vulnerable rather than taking measures which adversely affect the bulk of the population with little benefit,” Tambyah maintains, saying he hopes ongoing restrictions “will be lifted in a month or earlier.”
Health Minister Ong told reporters on Wednesday that the current wave of infections will not last “indefinitely” and will peak at some point in a “new equilibrium with the virus” as the population builds up better immunity and more people receive booster shots, which have recently been made available to people aged 30 years and older.
“Hopefully this [new equilibrium] will come in the next few months. There may not be a peak but a plateau followed by a downturn. It is very hard to tell,” said Tambyah. “The aim is to reach a low level of endemicity, like the Zika virus, which appears in Singapore every now and again with a few imported cases and a handful of local cases every year.”
https://asiatimes.com/2021/10/highly-vaccinated-singapore-sets-a-worrying-example/
Donkey Cheng is proud of OYK and LW woah!
Singapore virus debate sowing rare disquiet in ruling party
Senior members of Singapore’s ruling People’s Action Party are concerned that mixed signals from the country’s virus task force are giving the appearance of divisions that could lead to rare infighting, people familiar with the situation said.
The party cadres, who decide which individuals are admitted to the PAP’s top decision making body, were concerned perceptions of a split could spur members to choose sides in the informal contest to succeed Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, whose plans to step aside were delayed amid the pandemic after his heir-apparent bowed out earlier this year. They said the prime minister or another senior member should take charge and show decisiveness, according to the people.
Lee’s disrupted succession plan — unusual in a country used to orderly transitions — has added more pressure on the PAP as it looks to keep the economy on track while dealing with rising concerns about foreign workers in the financial hub. Although the party prolonged its nearly six-decade rule in an election last year, the opposition gained a record number of seats.
While the virus task force and Lee’s cabinet make key decisions and implement them as a team, Finance Minister Lawrence Wong and Health Minister Ong Ye Kung have noticeably focused on different aspects of the pandemic response in recent public comments as the country announced stop-start changes in its reopening plan. Wong has generally appeared to favour tighter measures to contain the virus, while Ong is seen as a greater advocate for opening. Both are regarded as prime contenders to one day take power from Lee.
The disquiet in the party reflects a broader debate within Singapore society about the pace of opening up, even as it boasts one of the world’s highest vaccination rates. The Southeast Asian financial hub has sought to balance the need to resume international travel and domestic activity with keeping overall mortality rate low, leading to abrupt shifts in policy on issues like working from home and dining out.
In an interview with Bloomberg TV on Monday, Wong denied any divisions, saying the task force carefully deliberates all decisions and “definitely” operates by consensus. He appeared to align more clearly with Ong, saying the country would continue to reopen even as officials looked to keep the caseload contained while augmenting hospital capacity to handle 5,000 daily new cases or more.
After targeting zero cases for most of the pandemic, Singapore has started to tolerate more. It saw 2,236 new cases on Tuesday, a new record tally.
“We do not take the trust that people have in the government for granted at all,” Wong said.
Ong, the Prime Minister’s Office and the PAP didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment on the perceived differences of opinion and whether Lee was considering changes to the virus task force.
“Having a clear leadership may work better — either Lee or his senior ministers should take charge,” Inderjit Singh, a former PAP lawmaker, said by phone.“The focus should be to tackle the pandemic and not a means to decide on selecting the future prime minister.”
One of the incidents that spurred confusion occurred earlier this month, when Wong told the press that Singapore shouldn’t rule out sweeping lockdown measures entirely amid rising infections. Those remarks appeared to contradict Ong, who was attending a Group of 20 meeting of health ministers in Rome at the time. He had earlier said he believed a so-called circuit breaker was “behind” Singapore.
Wong and Ong both rose to the fore as potential successors to Lee after his designated heir, Heng Swee Keat, shocked Singapore by stepping aside in April. At the time, Lee said the goal was to identify a successor among younger leaders before the next election due in 2025.
As the main public face of Singapore’s virus response last year, Wong won plaudits for speaking clearly to reassure the public and acting decisively to stem a surge in infections in foreign worker dorms. When he became finance minister after Heng stepped aside, Ong became a co-chair as health minister and the team presided over a vaccination campaign that has now inoculated more than four in every five people — a feat that other developed nations have struggled to achieve.
Yet views between Wong and Ong appeared to diverge shortly after the task force drew up plans to reopen more when 80% of the population was vaccinated. In July, Ong said Singapore must find ways to live with the virus and it would not be “unusual at all” to have 200 cases or more per day.
But by Sept. 3, that resolve was tested with daily infections climbing higher than 200. Wong then made it clear the government would keep current rules and not make new opening moves. The government implemented more regular testing for some workers and expanded home recovery for Covid-19 patients to prevent hospitals from getting overwhelmed.
In the middle of the month, Ong called the jump in infections a “rite of passage” for nations that have resumed some semblance of normalcy. That stirred discontent, with more than 6,300 people signing a petition calling for Ong to resign. Others have taken to social media to voice their frustrations with home recovery arrangements and post satirical memes.
“For friends who know my phone numbers, they text me all the time and give me that feedback, but for every one of them I also get another one to say ‘why don’t we lock down,’” Ong said during a health summit in mid-September in response to a question on whether the government was being too cautious about reopening. “So, there is a range of risk appetites around Singapore.”
A survey by Milieu Insight found that 52% of Singaporeans felt the latest restrictions on social gatherings were “just right,” with 25% saying they were too strict and the rest calling them too lax, the Straits Times reported on Tuesday.
“The differences in approaches and tone have been magnified in large part because of the public awareness” that Wong and Ong are frontrunners to become prime minister, said Nydia Ngiow, Singapore-based senior director at BowerGroupAsia, a strategic policy advisory firm.
Such publicly divergent views would usually be unheard of for a party used to the strong-arm leadership of its founding father Lee Kuan Yew, according to Bilveer Singh, associate professor at the National University of Singapore’s department of political science.
“In the late 1970’s Lee Kuan Yew said, ‘give clear signals — don’t confuse people,” Singh said. “This is the master talking. Now, somehow or another, I think the PAP failed here.”
https://sg.finance.yahoo.com/news/singapore-virus-debate-sowing-rare-disquiet-in-ruling-party-043451483.html
Are Sinkies ready for 3.2K new cases a day?