90-year-old fully vaccinated man is Singapore's first to die from Covid-19 complications

[SINGAPORE]

A 90-year-old man who was fully vaccinated but had a history of chronic kidney disease and hypertension died from Covid-19 complications on Tuesday, the Ministry of Health (MOH) said.

He is the first fully vaccinated person to die from issues linked to Covid-19 in Singapore. He had developed symptoms on July 29 and was detected when he was tested for the coronavirus on Aug 1 as part of community surveillance testing.

On Aug 2, he developed shortness of breath and giddiness, and was taken to Tan Tock Seng Hospital where he was admitted directly to the intensive care unit for septic shock from Covid-19 pneumonia.

He had been fully vaccinated against Covid-19, but was advanced in age and had a history of chronic kidney disease and hypertension, said MOH in its daily update.

In total, 45 people have died from complications due to the Covid-19 infection in Singapore.

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No new clusters were announced on Tuesday. The cluster linked to a dormitory located at 43 Sungei Kadut Loop grew to 14, with one new case added to its tally.

There were 56 new infections detected, and of these, 52 were locally transmitted. Of the local cases, 35 were linked to previous cases and already quarantined and another three linked cases were not in quarantine when they tested positive.

A total of 14 cases remain unlinked.

There were also four imported cases that were detected and isolated upon arrival in Singapore.

MOH also said six clusters have been closed. With that, there are now 93 active clusters, ranging between three and 1,155 infections.

MOH also said the number of new cases in the community has fallen from 481 the week before to 322 in the past week. The number of unlinked cases has decreased from 135 to 91 in the same period.

Currently, 404 patients are in hospital. Most are well and under observation, said MOH. Of these, 30 require oxygen supplementation, while six are in critical condition in the intensive care unit. Seven of these 40 patients are fully vaccinated.

Of the seriously ill, 31 are seniors aged above 60, and of them, 25 are completely unvaccinated or partially vaccinated.

MOH said there is continuing evidence that almost all fully vaccinated individuals do not suffer serious disease when infected, unless they have underlying medical conditions that make them more susceptible.

Over the past 28 days, the percentage of unvaccinated people who became severely ill or died is 9.6 per cent, while that for the fully vaccinated is 1.4 per cent, the ministry added.

On the country's vaccination progress, MOH said 76 per cent of Singapore's population were fully vaccinated as at Sunday, while 82 per cent have received at least one dose.

A total of 8,464,972 doses of Covid-19 vaccines have been administered under the national vaccination programme, covering 4,440,268 people, with 4,155,680 people having completed the full vaccination regimen.

In addition, 151,089 doses of other vaccines recognised in the World Health Organisation's Emergency Use Listing have been administered, covering 83,968 people.

THE STRAITS TIMES