Singapore sees Covid-19 cases double in a day

Case numbers on Tuesdays tend to be higher as they reflect the spike in infections after the weekend.- ST

SINGAPORE (The Straits Times/Asia News Network): There were 11,504 new Covid-19 cases recorded in Singapore on Tuesday (June 28), more than double the 5,309 cases on Monday.

This marks the highest daily number of infections in more than three months, since March 22 when it was over 13,000.

It is also more than last Tuesday's 7,109 cases.

Case numbers on Tuesdays tend to be higher compared with the rest of the week as they reflect the spike in infections after the weekend, when more people are out in various social settings.

The week-on-week infection ratio rose slightly to 1.62 on Tuesday, the Ministry of Health (MOH) reported in an update on its website, up from 1.56 on Monday.

Last Tuesday's ratio was 1.23.

The rate refers to the ratio of community cases for the past week over that of the week before. A rate of more than 1 shows the number of new weekly Covid-19 cases is increasing.

MOH said there were 437 patients hospitalised, with nine in intensive care and 36 requiring oxygen support.

There was one death reported.

Of the new local Covid-19 cases, 743 were detected through polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests.

Another 9,989 were detected through antigen rapid tests (ART), which means they either had no symptoms or their symptoms were mild.

There were 772 new imported cases, with 24 detected through PCR tests and 748 through ART.

Singapore has recorded a total of 1,425,171 Covid-19 cases, and 1,410 deaths.

Deputy Prime Minister Lawrence Wong said on Monday there is no need to tighten safe management measures for now but this cannot be ruled out as more Covid-19 infections are reported.

He also said the uptick in the number of infections is driven by the newer BA.4 and BA.5 Omicron sub-variants.

But there is no evidence yet the current infections are more severe, and hospitals are still able to cope with the situation.

Monday also saw the first death of a Covid-19 patient under 12 years old.

The one-and-a-half year old child died of encephalitis - or inflammation of the brain - due to Covid-19 and two other viruses.