According to the Ministry of Health (MOH), by 01 Jun 2020, if the situation in Singapore continues to improve
- Community cases staying low
- migrant worker cases in dormitories under control.
Singapore can then further consider opening up.
As part of the preventive measures to avoid a second wave of the outbreak. Singapore will progressively open up in an phased and calibrated manner.
The Indicators for phased opening is as follows:
First, numbers are important but they are not the only thing. We need to be assured that community transmission locally is stemmed, or very low. Community cases should ideally fall to zero or single-digits daily, with very low numbers of unlinked cases, and not just for one day, but sustained over a period of time. We also need to see a decrease in migrant worker cases. These cases are high today, partly due to proactive case-finding in some settings. While we have been able to keep local community cases low despite a high number of cases among migrant workers, it is equally important to reduce the migrant worker cases over time, though it will take a while longer. Otherwise, we will continue to be at risk of a spillover from the dormitories into the wider population
Second, we need to make an assessment of the situation globally and for individual countries, to inform the extent and approach on reopening our borders. We would review the rate of transmissions in other countries, as well as what they have done to contain the spread. For any re-opening of our borders, we are likely to start small and selectively, and to continue to impose a mix of isolation and test requirements, to protect ourselves from new imported cases leading to community spread.
Third, we must put in place a system to allow us to open up safely. When we allow more business and social activities to resume, there will be more interactions and a higher risk of virus transmission at the workplace and in the community. Therefore we need to step up our capability and capacity to test and detect cases early, contact trace quickly, ringfence close contacts promptly, and establish the original source of the infection to stop other undetected transmission chains if any. These are the key enablers which will give us the confidence to re-open.