Singapore has achieved what no other country has - low COVID-19 case count & high vaccination rates
Some people in Singapore appear to be quite happy with the new restrictions as they, supposedly, show how bad and incompetent the local government is, so they can come out to gloat again. Really?
I think the biggest problem of the modern age is that we have all of these remarkable devices, laptops, smartphones, high speed internet giving us access to a wealth of information but relatively few people use it to seek knowledge but, instead, they use it as a bullhorn to broadcast their ignorance.
So, again, let's look at the facts and figures.
After over a year of fighting the disease, we now have enough of information to classify countries into four groups regarding their handling of the pandemic:
High incidence / high vaccination rates.
High incidence / low vaccination rates.
Low incidence / low vaccination rates.
Low incidence / high vaccination rates - the Holy Grail of the pandemic response.
The first group comprises mainly developed nations, where both the means of tracking the virus and responding to it are the highest. They suffered the most but were able to either develop or buy a large number of vaccines.
The second group consists mainly of low-income countries where the virus went out of control.
The third groups countries like China, Taiwan, New Zealand or Australia (and, until recently, Vietnam or Thailand, which are now suffering fresh outbreaks), where incidence of Covid-19 was greatly reduced through strict lockdowns and isolation from foreign visitors. Their local vaccination campaigns, however, are lagging badly, leaving them exposed to the virus, should it make landing on their soil again.
The fourth group is the Holy Grail of the pandemic response - a low case count, meaning the virus has been brought under relative control, plus a high vaccination rate, offering protection against any possible future outbreaks.
The number of countries that fulfill these criteria is one - Singapore.
The world's most broadly vaccinated nation, Israel, had to deal with a massive outbreak and raced ahead to inoculate as many people as possible - although, you should notice, the effort has largely flatlined just around the elections at the end of March (suggesting that politics played a huge role too).
UK or the US, which keep distributing millions of shots, have also suffered thousands of deaths. Rest of Europe is playing catch up, ahead of intended reopening for the summer months.
Cumulative death rates are today around 1800 people per 1 million inhabitants in the US or UK, 1600 in the EU, 740 in Israel and just 5.3 in Singapore.
When it comes to vaccination rates, Singapore has managed to fully vaccinate about 25% of the local population - behind Israel (58%), US (37%) or UK (30%) but ahead of the EU (14%) or New Zealand (3%).
And, mind you, it has done that using only the best mRNA vaccines by Pfizer and Moderna - without having to rely on less effective and more controversial products by AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson, Sinopharm, Sinovac or Russian Sputnik V.
Smaller countries which relied on these vaccines and achieved even supremely high vaccination rates (like Seychelles where over 70% of people received at least one dose) are seeing a resurgence of the virus, likely due to their lower efficacy.
In other words, Singapore has managed to keep the spread of the virus to the minimum (despite reliance on foreign workforce), while it keeps vaccinating people at relatively high rates and only with the best available vaccines.
No other country comes close.
Can you consider doing a follow up article on this after this current wave of infection; highlights on the performance of governments & their healthcare sys from different countries (such as China, Japan, Sweden, Taiwan and SG)?