COVID-19: Singapore preliminarily confirms 623 more cases, total crosses 5,000
Staff Writer, Singapore
Editorial Team
Yahoo News Singapore17 April 2020
Workers look out of Westlite Dormitory, which has been gazetted as an isolation area to curb the spread of COVID-19 in Singapore, on 6 April, 2020. (PHOTO: Reuters)More
SINGAPORE — The Ministry of Health (MOH) said it has preliminarily confirmed 623 more COVID-19 cases in Singapore as of Friday (17 April) noon, taking its total to 5,050.
The majority of these cases are foreign workers in dormitories, said the ministry.
“We are still working through the details of these cases, and further updates will be shared via the MOH press release that will be issued later tonight,” it added.
The announcement comes a day after Singapore reported a single-day high of 728 cases.
At least 26 clusters linked to foreign worker dormitories have been identified thus far, including the largest cluster of 979 cases linked to S11 Dormitory@Punggol.
The S11 Dormitory@Punggol is one of 13 dorms that have been gazetted as isolation areas.
Those linked to the dorm account for over 40 per cent of the total 2,312 linked to such dorms and construction sites.
As of Thursday, 683 patients have fully recovered and have been discharged from hospital or community facilities.
Most of the 1,886 hospitalised cases are stable or improving, while 23 are in critical condition in the intensive care unit on Thursday. A total of 1,848 cases who are clinically well but still test positive for COVID-19 are isolated and cared for at community facilities.
Ten cases here have died from complications due to COVID-19 infection, including a 70-year-old Singaporean man on Tuesday.
Another two patients, who tested positive for the virus, have died from causes unrelated to COVID-19.
MOH STATEMENT IN FULL:
“As of 17 April 2020, 12pm, the Ministry of Health (MOH) has preliminarily confirmed an additional 623 cases of COVID-19 infection in Singapore, the majority of whom are foreign workers in the dormitories.
We are still working through the details of these cases, and further updates will be shared via the MOH press release that will be issued later tonight.”
