As millions of Australians endured strict lockdowns this week, Scott Morrison announced the government was still working on a plan to transition to a post-vaccination future.
But with some nations racing ahead with their vaccination schemes, Australia isn’t alone in considering a roadmap out of the pandemic.
Singapore, which like Australia has mostly followed a zero transmission model, is now planning an exit strategy that will involve “learning to live with COVID-19”.
And while Australia is yet to announce firm dates for its pathway out of lockdowns, Singapore could get there much sooner.
A bold shift: ‘It is possible to live normally with COVID-19’
When Singapore experienced a surge in COVID-19 cases last month, it acted as it has before: Limiting households gatherings, continuing to encourage people to work from home and even announcing new plans to segregate flights and passengers from high-risk countries.
But as the Government started to get a handle on the new outbreak, some within its ranks wondered if there was another way.
As Singapore races to vaccinate as many people as possible, it’s contemplating a future that no longer includes lockdowns and restrictions.
“The bad news is that COVID-19 may never go away. The good news is that it is possible to live normally with it in our midst,” Trade Minister Gan Kim Yong, Finance Minister Lawrence Wong and Health Minister Ong Ye Kung wrote in the Strait Times.
The ministers suggested that like flu, the coronavirus will continue to mutate and “survive in the community”. But just as we’ve learned to live with influenza without implementing lockdowns or closing our borders, we can also learn to live with COVID-19
“We can’t eradicate it, but we can turn the pandemic into something much less threatening, like influenza, hand, foot and mouth disease, or chickenpox, and get on with our lives,” they wrote.
Vaccinations are key to Singapore’s strategy
Singapore’s ministers have proposed one day scrapping lockdowns, home isolation and restrictions.
A key reason they have been able to contemplate such a change is that they’re racing ahead with vaccines.
Nearly two-thirds of Singaporeans have received one dose of the vaccine, with a goal for all eligible residents to be fully vaccinated by August 9.
While other Asian nations have lagged behind in their roll-out — Thailand has vaccinated just 10 per cent of its population and South Korea has hit almost 30 per cent — nearly 60 per cent of Singapore’s residents have received one dose of the vaccine, while 37 per cent are fully vaccinated.
Singapore’s government aims to have two-thirds of residents fully inoculated by August 9, and will soon allow children over 12 to get the jab to ensure they hit their goal.
Vaccines don’t prevent transmission of the virus, but they do reduce the severity of symptoms.
When the highly infectious Delta variant spread through Singapore’s Changi Airport in May, 19 of the 28 terminal workers who contracted the virus were fully vaccinated.
However, many of them were totally asymptomatic and those who did have symptoms reported runny noses, coughs and mild fevers.
How Singapore’s roadmap compares to Australia.
Once the vaccination targets have been hit, the ministers’ proposal still aims to keep the coronavirus contained with testing and surveillance, but with some key differences.
Those that do fall sick with COVID-19 will be allowed to recover at home, and citizens will be urged to practice “social responsibility” such as good hygiene and staying away from crowds when feeling unwell.
Tests will be more specifically targeted at the borders to identify those coming in with the virus and at mass gathering events within Singapore. More rapid testing will provide faster results when people are visiting their workplace, pharmacies or shopping centres.
Data from other countries with speedy vaccine drives that have also eased restrictions, such as Israel, UK and the US, will be monitored closely, experts say.
And there are even plans to stop counting the daily COVID-19 cases. Instead of monitoring daily infection numbers, authorities will focus on how many fall very sick and other health outcomes.
Australia, in comparison, is considering four phases as it transitions to managing COVID-19 as an infectious disease like any other in the community. But unlike Singapore, many of the details of what will change in the later stages are still being worked out.
Phase one will include trials of home-quarantine for vaccinated travellers, while phase two will ease restrictions including border controls for vaccinated Australians and use lockdowns only as a last resort.
That phase will depend on a yet-to-be-determined percentage of the population being vaccinated. Unlike Singapore’s high vaccination rate, only 7.92 per cent of Australia’s population is fully vaccinated.
The third phase, which sees Australia dealing with COVID-19 like it does the seasonal flu, more closely resembles Singapore’s approach of no longer implementing lockdowns and gradually opening the borders. The final phase will be a return to pre-pandemic travel and life.
For Professor Yik-Ying Teo, the Dean of the Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health at the National University of Singapore, living with COVID-19 is an “aspiration” that every country will eventually have to learn to do.
Having accepted that it’s “not possible to eliminate the coronavirus completely,” Professor Yik-Ying says it won’t be sustainable for countries to keep their borders shut forever.
“And the moment countries lift their border control measures, this is where there will be regular imports of COVID-19 and that will circulate within the community,” he told the ABC.
“So given that we are unable to sustain our public health measures or what we call non-pharmaceutical interventions, which include border controls, then we would have to look at what is the next most feasible approach.”
