As the number of hospitalised Covid-19 patients here continues to fall steadily, hospitals are cautiously turning their Covid-19 wards back into regular ones.
Professor Teo Yik Ying, dean of the National University of Singapore's Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health, said on Thursday that the drop in patients in the intensive care unit reflects the changing demographics of those infected over the past two months. But from April, the circuit breaker measures significantly reduced the infection rate among such groups. Instead, the vast majority of the cases were young, healthy migrant workers less likely to experience a severe infection, thus leading to lower ICU numbers.
During the circuit breaker period, non-urgent appointments at clinics and elective surgical procedures had been postponed. Patients with more urgent needs will be prioritised, and patients who are stable but still require specialist care will continue to be looked after through other methods like teleconsultation.