Damping the Spread of COVID-19

In his National Day message to Singaporeans on Sunday (Aug 8), PM Lee Hsien Loong said more than two thirds of Singapore residents are fully vaccinated and that the country is in a more resilient position and can now look forward to a "careful, step-by-step re-opening" of the economy. But he noted that COVID-19 has strained fault lines in Singapore society, and brought up "difficult issues" that its people need to deal with, including that of race and religion.

 Chinese New Year is aroudn the corner, and here is the safe management measures to take note: https://www.gov.sg/article/safe-management-measures-and-chinese-new-year There will be a cap of 8 unique visitors per household per day. If you are doing house visits, limit your visits to family and to not more than 2 households per day. Otherwise, connect digitally with your family and friends. When dining out, wear a mask if you’re not eating or drinking. This means that masks must be worn during the tossing of yusheng. Avoid raising voices at all times.  Lohei  should be done without saying the usual auspicious phrases. There must not be multiple table bookings, unless you are from the same household. But even so, there should not be inter-mingling across tables.

 https://www.thelancet.com/article/S0140-6736(20)32007-9/fulltext This Health Policy paper examine the approaches taken by nine high-income countries and regions that have started to ease COVID-19 restrictions: five in the Asia Pacific region (ie, Hong Kong, Japan, New Zealand, Singapore, and South Korea) and four in Europe (ie, Germany, Norway, Spain, and the UK). This comparative analysis presents important lessons to be learnt from the experiences of these countries and regions. Although the future of the virus is unknown at present, countries should continue to share their experiences, shield populations who are at risk, and suppress transmission to save lives.

Singapore may enter Phase 3 of its reopening by the end of this year, should community cases remain low as the country intensifies testing and contact tracing. But to enter Phase Three, Singapore will have to keep its guard up and meet several key conditions. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q8z9LFnyWbQ

https://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/risk/our-insights/covid-19-implications-for-business#  https://www.mckinsey.com/~/media/mckinsey/business%20functions/risk/our%20insights/covid%2019%20implications%20for%20business/preventing%20future%20waves%20of%20covid%2019/preventing-future-waves-of-covid-19.pdf Human ingenuity and adaptiveness helped: COVID-19 has infected more than 24 million people and left more than 800,000 dead as of this writing, the early projections of mortality were much worse. Pockets of resistance against wearing masks and complying with other measures notwithstanding, the global public-health response has saved millions of lives.  Increasingly, countries are restarting more aspects of normal life while keeping case numbers tenuously in check.

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3WViNUlcbO4 Situation in India continue to be the most worrying. There was good progress in some cities, according to my colleagues in India. Hope situation of the whole country will improve soon. Public education and leadership is very important in this period.

https://medicine.nus.edu.sg/learning-from-covid-19-to-build-a-resilient-future/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1349&v=FAUM74AbNZc&feature=emb_logo A few points from Prof Richard Horton, Editor-in-Chief of The Lancet: The world has been plunged into a state of political instability which is difficult to navigate. The xenophobia towards China, zero leadership from the United States and a collapse in public trust in many governments, have had a huge role to play in the mismanagement of this pandemic. He commended the quick response from China, which did everything in her power to send warning signals.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BxMTnKZyLr0 https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/malaysia As of today, Malaysia has total cases 8,904, with very low number of new cases in the past 50 days. It has not been easy to reach here: Malaysia used to be in the worst situaiton among all southeast Asia coutnries back in March, and they have a population of 32 million. This is a great example to show that "it's never too late to mend". 亡羊补牢，犹未为晚。

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0RjDqEauJMU https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/viet-nam/ Vietnam succeeded in containing COVID-19: as of today, total 420 cases, 0 death, with almost 100 million population!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ReI6ROZNbkk https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/taiwan/ I checked today's COVID-19 data of Taiwan: total cases 458, death number 7, with whole population of 24 million. This was a remarkable success for Taiwan government and people! It has been credited with taking early action to prevent the spread of the coronavirus as it emerged and for avoiding the lockdown measures many other countries implemented. Chen Chien-jen, Taiwan’s Vice President, received a Doctor of Science degree in epidemiology and human genetics from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in 1982. This webcast showed that not only Dr. Chen Chien-jen, but also the Taiwan government, that are professional and efficient when coping with COVID-19. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZgmdwZnNF0Q https://covid19japan.com/ Japan has gone its own way on the coronavirus pandemic from its beginning, with a delayed response, limited testing and a gentler lockdown. Japan was lucky that people have habit of wearing mask before COVID-19. The rigorous contact tracing also helped. Recently, there was rising number of new cases, but considering their big population, situation seems to be under control. It is not a disaster, but also not a success that other countries should learn from. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PHV4ukogdE0 https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/south-korea This video uploaded in March, explaining experience from South Korea, who flattened their curve very quickly after the initial spike of COVID-19. They took preventative actions, including Social distancing, Contact tracing, Widespread testing, and Early preparation. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fvXhcWXfOyg https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/china I found a video uploaded in March, that explain China experience in coping with COVID-19.   Lockdown in 3 days.  Emergency hospital in ten days.  Self-quarantine for 14 days.   Control of daily activities.  Working from home.