SINGAPORE: Singapore's daily COVID-19 infections are rising, but the number of severe cases and deaths should be lower than before, says a public health expert.
"We expect that the number of severe cases and deaths will be lower than it was historically prior to achieving high levels of vaccination in the community," said Associate Professor Ashley St John from the emerging infectious diseases programme of Duke-NUS Medical School.
This is because vaccinated individuals are more than 20 times less likely to land in hospital. More than 90 per cent of Singapore's eligible population are fully vaccinated and 57 per cent have had an additional booster shot.
The Omicron variant has sparked another wave of infection in Singapore, with 5,469 new COVID-19 cases reported on Thursday (Jan 27).
On when this wave will peak, she said that it will be difficult to predict: "But it’s likely that COVID-19 will be with us for quite a while with periodic waves of cases."
Earlier, authorities had said that Singapore could see more than 15,000 COVID-19 cases a day.
The recent rise in cases also came after the Health Ministry changed how the daily numbers are reported. It now includes cases who tested positive on antigen rapid tests (ART), and are well or have a mild condition.
Of the more than 5,000 cases on Thursday, 3,571 were from ART and 1,898 from polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests.
Professor Dale Fisher, who is professor of medicine at the NUS Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, likened counting COVID-19 case numbers to counting common colds, with most diagnosed on ART over PCR tests.
Prof Fisher said that 99.7 per cent of cases reported are mild or asymptomatic and "a strategic change will be needed".
Assoc Prof St John said that the ICU utilisation rate is "probably more important now" than case numbers. There are now 611 hospitalised for COVID-19, and 12 are in ICU. Another 49 need oxygen supplementation.
At the peak of the Delta wave, there were about 80 to more than 100 people in ICU at any one time, and 200 to 300 more needing oxygen.
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