Singaporeans take fright at relaxation of Covid restrictions

Reopening the city-state has stoked a surge in new cases and panic among anxious residents

Protesters from the US to Australia and across Europe have railed against government interference and repressive Covid restrictions. But in Singapore, a sizeable chunk of the population is asking for even greater state control.

A petition is circulating in the city-state to bring back mandatory quarantine for all overseas travellers, despite the Delta variant already circulating widely, while a quarter of Singaporeans are in favour of a return to lockdown restrictions.

Singapore’s government announced with great optimism in June that it would change its “zero-Covid” approach and instead learn to live with the virus.

Its strategy was held up as a model for other countries looking for a safe way out of the pandemic. But as cases inevitably rose in August and September, panic set in.

Authorities responded this week by rolling back freedoms for residents despite outpacing most advanced economies in fully vaccinating 82 per cent of its population.

Tightly controlled Singapore, whose quasi-authoritarian government largely bars any protest, had come the furthest among Asian cities in opening up.

The decision has led to a rare occurrence in the city-state: rising public dissent over the government’s strategy.

“I have never in 20 years seen the academic or medical professional industry so vocal in their disagreement with the government as it is over the treatment of asymptomatic cases,” said Jeremy Lim, of the Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health at the National University of Singapore.

Nearly a quarter of people in Singapore felt the latest restrictions were too lax, while more than half felt they were “just right”, according to market research firm Milieu Insight this week. One quarter felt they were too strict.

“What surprised me is how divided people were. There were a lot of people upset by the measures but an equal amount were supportive of more restrictions,” said Stephen Tracy, managing director of Milieu. “There is a sense, however, that the latest rules are not in line with the strategy the government laid out.”

A petition calling for all returning travellers to quarantine for two weeks in designated hotels or government facilities garnered nearly 3,000 signatures by Thursday.

“There is a lower tolerance for the sheer number of deaths and cases seen in other countries because of the way we avoided that for most of the pandemic,” said Dale Fisher, a senior infectious diseases consultant at Singapore’s National University Hospital. 

Anonymous