All Singapore Covid-19 cases in April were of the Omicron variant

ALL local and imported cases of Covid-19 last month which underwent genome-wide sequencing were infected with the Omicron variant.

The Ministry of Health (MOH) said on Thursday (May 19) that of the local cases, 99 per cent were the sub-variant BA.2 strain and and its lineages, which include BA.2.12.1.

The remaining 1 per cent were the BA.1 sub-variant.

Of the imported cases, 98 per cent were the BA.2 sub-variant and its lineages, 1 per cent were the BA.1 sub-variant and its lineages, and 1 per cent from recombinant lineages which include XJ and XE. Two imported cases were infected with the BA.4 strain.

The XJ and XE strains are hybrids of the original Omicron strain BA.1 and the BA.2 sub-variant.

On Sunday, MOH said that it had detected 2 local cases of the BA.4 sub variant and 1 local case of the BA.5 sub variant.

All 3 are the first community cases confirmed to be infected with the BA.4 and BA.5 variants, which the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control had recently described as variants of concern.

On Thursday, MOH reported 4,578 new cases of Covid-19, down from 6,442 the day before.

The number of hospitalisations stood at 302 of which 49 require oxygen supplementation while 8 patients remain under intensive care.

SEE ALSO

Singapore wants to keep borders open even if Covid variant emerges

There were 2 deaths recorded.

The week on week infection ratio rose to 1.14, from 1.05 the day before.

The rate refers to the ratio of community cases for the past week over those of the week before. A rate of more than 1 shows the number of new weekly Covid-19 cases is increasing. THE STRAITS TIMES