TR EMERITUS

There was a report that several patients visiting clinics were tested at random for covid-19 and a certain number was found to be positive. This suggested that the community spread was more widespread than thought previously. I was not surprised by this finding. It would be more helpful if the ministry of health disclosed the number that were tested and the number that were found to be positive and the proportion that were asymptomatic. I believed all along that the virus had already been spread through the community, but it did not cause any serious problem for most people. In many cases, the infections were mild or the virus was not even noticed. I had said, on several occasions, that the containment measures under code Orange were ineffective. The recent increase in infected cases probably proved my point. If these measures were effective, it would not have caused the widespread infection that has been discovered by the shocking number of tests found to be positive in recent days. I suspect that if more testing were carried out in the general population, the reported cases would also increase sharply. My guess is that already 6% of the population has been infected. For a population of 5.5 million, this meant that 330,000 had been infected already. I obtained the 6% by looking at the number of reported cases in Singapore as a proportion of the total tests carried out. If I use the figures for America, the proportion would increase to 20%.This would mean that 1.1 million people in Singapore would already have been infected. If 6% had been infected, does it mean that there is the risk of the virus being spread to the remaining 94% of the population? I do not think so. Quite likely, it suggest that a large proportion of the 94% had already been exposed but somehow they are immune to the virus. Of course, I might be wrong. But in the absence of convincing data, I like to rely on my common sense and gut feel. I am not worried about the large number of reported cases. I consider that it is the related to the number of tests that are carried out. If more people are tested, more would be discovered to be infected. I also speculate that the majority of these cases would be found to be mild. I pay more attention to the death rate from the coronavirus. The statistics from the website of the World Health Organization showed that the death rate from this virus is 2 per million in Singapore. It is 100 per million in America and higher in some European countries. Why is the death rate in Singapore so low? Could it be due to the high standard of medical facilities in Singapore? I would only attribute a small portion to this factor. The death rate in Germany is 52 per million and their health care standard must be comparable to Singapore. I guess that the main factor is the warm climate in Singapore. The coronavirus may spread in Singapore, but it will not result in many deaths, unlike the countries with cold climates. To back up this reasoning, I saw that the death rate in Malaysia is only 3 per million. They have a significant rural sector with poorer access to medical facilities. They also have a low death rate. I assume that the warm climate plays a part. I state again that I may be wrong. I do not have enough data to prove my point. But my reasoning is made with all the data that is publicly available. I look at reports and data from all over the world, and especially in Singapore. If my reasoning is correct, then I must criticize the ministerial task force for wasting so much resources in carrying out the wrong strategy. a) The containment measures under code Orange is a big waste of resources. b) The circuit breaker is unnecessary and is too costly to the economy and to the livelihood of the people. c) The costly quarantine measures might also be unnecessary. I even wonder if Singapore is an example of the herd immunity strategy. If a large proportion of the population has already been exposed to the virus and most people do not become sick, we might have already achieved the goal of herd immunity. Let me take a look at the number of people that are in critical conditions to see if we should be worried about it. We do not need to worry about the health system being overwhelmed, because we have the time to prepare for it. We should increase the number of beds, ventilators and medical professionals. It will cost much less than the budget of $40 billion that is spent on the relief measures. This does not count the losses incurred by the people and businesses at large, that are not adequately compensated by the relief measures. We can also take special measures to protect the elderly sick from being infected. It may require them to be isolated and taken care of by care screened givers. This is better than locking down the entire population. We can expect our death rate to increase from 2 per million, but so long as it is below 10 per million, we need not be alarmed. I am aware that I might be missing some critical information that could change my reasoning. If there are relevant information, I will analyze them and see if I need to change my conclusion. If I were in the task force, would I make decisions based on my assumption? The answer is - I would get the relevant information to verify the credibility of my assumption. If there is a high degree of probably, I would act on my assumption and remove the 'circuit breaker' early. But I would certainly ask for information to verify my assumption first.   Tan Kin Lian        Read More →

If you look at geopolitics through the lens of Covid-19, one thing should be very clear. Neither the world’s big economies have distinguished themselves. Both China and the US have behaved in such a way that leaves much to be desired. China is the obvious bogyman. The virus started here. While China has gained applause for locking down Wuhan, one cannot accept everything from China’s government at face value. The Chinese government did try to cover it up. The doctor who tried to warn the world died and there have been enough reports floating around the net to suggests that all is not as well as the Chinese Communist Party (“CCP”) would have you believe. China’s sudden generosity should remind one of sayings like – “Beware the naked man offering you his shirt.” There has to be a catch somewhere. If China is untrustworthy, the US is arrogant and stupid. The nicest thing that one can say about the Trump Administration’s handling of the pandemic is that it has given comedians material for the next decade. Comedy aside, watching the pandemic unfold in the US is tragic. The nation that gave us human progress has now become a bad zombie apocalypse movie in denial. Unfortunately, the rest of us seem rather beholden to the elephants of the global economic system. America in particular is listened to because it underpins most of the global security architecture that supports our entire global system. While I have said that America is the world’s most benevolent superpower in history, the problem is that American foreign policy has always rested on the principle of “Us versus them.” During the Cold War, this was easy. The USSR was strong enough to be a challenge and the system of Communism was obviously “bad.” With the fall of the USSR, the US had a tough time trying to find a polar opposite. It tried with Saddam Hussain but even then, nobody thought Saddam was a serious threat to the rest of the world. When America goes into “With US or Against US” mode, the rest of the world gets stuck as it means losing potential business to keep Americans happy. It seems that the rest of us are stuck between an untrustworthy and a stupid elephant. It sounds like a case of choose one and the other squashes you. Navigating between them becomes something of a thankless art form. There is, however, a third way – namely for smaller countries to find ways of cooperating. In this respect, the Europeans got it right. After the second World War, the Europeans realized that the two world wars started between competition between France and Germany. The trick was to tie French and German interest so closely together that they’d realise there was more to gain together than to go to war. The European Union is by no means perfect. Covid-19 has shown how little unity there is behind the talk of a United Europe as countries shit themselves down. There is also more bureaucracy than one might consider healthy. At times it seems that the great beneficiaries of the European project are the armies of bureaucrats in Brussels. Having said that, the EU has succeeded brilliantly in its original aim, which was to ensure peace through prosperity. Nobody from the Baby Boomers onwards imagines that its possible for war to break out on the European continent. The generation before never imagined peace would last in Europe. While the individual economies of the Europe are smaller than the two elephants, the EU as a collective with a single customs union is bigger than either China or the US. Where the EU fall short is on the issue of defense. As of the time of writing, the Europeans have not been able to create a unified military structure in the same way it has created an economic structure. There was a tacit admission from Angela Merkel that Europe had been too dependent on American military support after Donald Trump scolded European leaders for not spending enough money of defense. A more aggressive Russia and an unreliable America should give the Europeans an incentive to change this. The rest of the world should take note of the EU as a project. There have been mistakes made. There is, for example, a sense that Europe is a fortress against the rest of the world. However, the idea of small nations getting together, pooling resources and trading with each other, is healthy. Poland, for example, has prospered by being in the EU. It trades with America and China but it is not dependent on either because it has trade with its neighbours. There is a downside to regional groupings. In many cases it becomes replacing dependence on the global elephant with a regional one. Europe is lucky because the regional power is Germany, which has been relatively benign and stayed dug into the European project. There are less benign examples. The answer may be to form unions that are close enough to encourage trade with neighbours but at the same time allowing individual member enough space to be their own nation. Encouraging greater cooperation is not going to be easy but as Covid 19 has shown, depending on elephants for your needs is not an option, especially when the elephants in question have obvious flaws. Elephants are still necessary but smaller players need to know how to band together in order to secure their own destinies.   Tang Li *The author blogs at http://beautifullyincoherent.blogspot.com/ .  Read More →

Without doubt, Singapore's Covid-19 cases will officially breach the 6000 cases barrier on Sunday (19th Apr), unless the SARS-CoV-2 virus decides to commit mass-suicide overnight. MOH has announced 596 cases of fresh infections for 18th April (12 pm), bringing the total number of cases to 6588. With the new cases, the island city is currently: 1. the 9th most seriously infected country in the world,  in terms of residential land mass, Click to see how the ranking is calculated 2. the 3rd country with the most number of infection increases in a week,  in terms of residential land mass, and Click to enlarge 3. the 2nd most infected country in the world,  in terms of residential land mass. Click to see complete list Readers are advised to remain calm and not worry too much about the figures being 6,000 or 60,000 as the situation, according to MOH, is "under control". * As of 1800 hours on 19th April, both the situation report for 18th April and 19th April lhave yet to be released by MOH.          Read More →