396 new Covid-19 cases in Singapore, including 3 in community and 3 imported

The community cases comprise three work pass holders. PHOTO: ST FILE

SINGAPORE - There were 396 new coronavirus cases confirmed as of Friday noon (July 31), taking Singapore's total to 52,205.

They included three community cases, said the Ministry of Health (MOH).

There were also three imported cases who had been placed on stay-home notices upon arrival in Singapore.

Migrant workers living in dormitories made up the vast majority of the other cases.

More details will be announced on Friday night.

On Thursday, four of the new coronavirus patients in the community announced were linked to the Covid-19 cluster at the Bukit Panjang Integrated Transport Hub, said MOH.

The cluster, first announced last Friday, now has eight patients, following Thursday's update. The four new patients comprised a Singaporean and three work permit holders.

They were asymptomatic and detected as part of proactive case finding of people working in a new workplace cluster that has emerged.

All four tested positive on Wednesday, but test results showed they likely contracted the infections in the past and were no longer infectious, said MOH.

As a precautionary measure, MOH is working with the Land Transport Authority to arrange for close contacts of the four new patients to be tested.

The earlier four patients linked to the transport hub cluster were all bus drivers, transport operator SMRT said on Sunday.

Meanwhile, a FairPrice outlet, Watsons, the My Briyani House eatery and McDonald's in Hillion Mall, which is linked to the transport hub, were added to the list of places visited by infectious coronavirus patients.

Mr Teh Tarik deli within the transport hub was also added to the list, along with department store myCK at 478 Tampines Street 44, Causeway Point and Al-Sahira Restaurant at 200 Jalan Sultan.

The ministry provides the list of locations and the times that infectious Covid-19 patients have visited for at least 30 minutes to get those who were at these places at specific periods to monitor their health closely for two weeks from the date of their visit.

The full list of locations and times can be found on MOH's website.

It has said that close contacts would already have been notified and there is no need to avoid these places, as they would have been cleaned if needed.

Four new imported Covid-19 cases were also announced on Thursday, comprising three work pass holders and one work permit holder.

The three work pass holders are employed here and had arrived from India between July 15 and 18.

The work permit holder arrived from Indonesia on July 18.

All of them were placed on 14-day stay-home notices upon arrival in Singapore and served their notices at dedicated facilities.

They had been tested while serving the notices, said MOH.

Migrant workers staying in dormitories made up the remaining 270 of the 278 new coronavirus patients announced on Thursday.

The average number of new daily cases in the community in a week has decreased from nine cases two weeks ago to three in the past week.

The number of unlinked cases in the community in a week has decreased from a daily average of five cases to one over the same period.

Singapore has had 27 deaths from Covid-19 complications, while 15 who tested positive have died of other causes.

Globally, the virus outbreak, which began in December last year, has infected more than 17.4 million people. More than 675,000 people have died.

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