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The Ministry of Health (MOH) confirmed 23 new cases of Covid-19 infection today (Apr. 18).

This brings the total number of cases to 60,831.

One of the cases announced today is in the community, and is currently unlinked. There are no new cases in the dormitories.

The remaining 22 cases announced today are imported.

1 case in the community

Case 62113 is a 39-year-old male Indonesian national who is a sea crew on board a bunker tanker. He had not disembarked from the vessel except to go for Covid-19 testing and vaccination.

He is asymptomatic, and was detected when he was tested on Apr. 15 as part of Rostered Routine Testing (RRT).

His pooled test result came back positive for Covid-19 the next day, and he was conveyed in an ambulance to the National Centre for Infectious Diseases. An individual test done on Apr. 16 also came back positive the next day.

His earlier tests from RRT — the last being on Apr. 1 — had all been negative for Covid-19 infection. His serological test result has come back negative, indicating that this is likely a current infection.

He has tested preliminarily positive for the B117 strain, and is pending further confirmatory tests.

Case 62113 received his first dose of Covid-19 vaccination on Apr. 15. As the vaccine does not contain live virus, he could not have been infected due to vaccination.

It is possible for one to be infected just before or just after vaccination, as it typically takes a few weeks for an individual to build up immunity after completing vaccination.

Epidemiological investigations are ongoing. In the meantime, all the identified close contacts of the case, including the crew members of the vessel, have been isolated and placed on quarantine, and will be tested at the start and end of their quarantine period so that MOH can detect asymptomatic cases.

MOH will also conduct serological tests for the close contacts to determine if the cases could have been infected by them.

22 imported cases

The 22 imported cases had all already been placed on SHN or isolated upon arrival in Singapore and were tested while serving SHN.

One of the imported cases tested negative during SHN

Case 62110 is a 43-year-old male Filipino sea crew who arrived from the Philippines on Mar. 24 to board a vessel that is docked in Singapore.

His on-arrival test on Mar. 24 was negative for Covid-19. He served SHN at a dedicated facility from Mar. 24 to Apr. 7, and his test done on Apr. 6 during SHN was also negative.

He boarded his designated vessel on Apr. 8, and did not disembark until he was conveyed to a hospital after testing positive for Covid-19 infection.

He was tested for Covid-19 on Apr. 16, as part of the Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore’s protocol to test sea crew.

His Ct value was very high, which is indicative of a low viral load, and his serology test result has also come back positive.

MOH said that given that these indicate likely past infection, they have classified the case as imported based on his travel history.

He is likely to be shedding minute fragments of the virus RNA, which are no longer transmissible and infective to others.

All but one of the imported cases was asymptomatic.

Five (Cases 62108, 62119, 62134, 62135 and 62136) are Singapore Permanent Residents who returned from India.

Two (Cases 62101 and 62123) are Dependant’s Pass holders who arrived from Nepal.

One (Case 62109) is a Long-Term Visit Pass holder who arrived from India.

Five (Cases 62103, 62104, 62129, 62132 and 62133) are Work Pass holders who arrived from India and Kazakhstan.

Five (Cases 62105, 62106, 62107, 62112 and 62130) are Work Permit holders who arrived from Bangladesh and India.

Four (Cases 62110, 62111, 62120 and 62121) are Short-Term Visit Pass holders.

• Cases 62110 and 62121 are sea crew who arrived from the Philippines and Myanmar respectively. Case 62110 was placed on SHN upon arrival in Singapore, and Case 62121 had not disembarked and was tested onboard.
• Cases 62111 and 62120 arrived from Indonesia and Romania for work assignments in Singapore.

68 remain in hospitals

22 more cases of Covid-19 infection have been discharged from hospitals or community isolation facilities. In all, 60,485 have fully recovered from the infection and have been discharged from hospitals or community care facilities.

There are currently 68 confirmed cases who are still in the hospital, most of whom are stable or improving.

Two are in the intensive care unit (ICU).

248 cases who have mild symptoms or who are clinically well but still test positive for Covid-19 are isolated and cared for at community facilities.

30 have passed away from complications due to Covid-19 infection.

No new locations added to list of places visited by infectious cases

MOH regularly updates a list of public places visited by confirmed Covid-19 cases for more than 30 minutes when they were infectious.

No new locations were added to the list on Apr. 18.

Here is the full list of locations visited by cases in the community during their infectious period in the past 14 days, as of Apr. 18:

Top photo by Peter Leong on Unsplash.