SENIORS GETTING THEIR 4TH JAB
More than 10,000 bivalent doses are given out each day.
Mr Neo Joo Yong, 70, was in line at Hong Kah North CC by himself on Monday. He walked from his home nearby to get his fourth dose — the Moderna bivalent vaccine — around 10am.
He previously wanted to get the jab in Jurong, and was glad to find out there was a mobile vaccination team located closer to him.
Mr Neo, whose first three jabs were also under Moderna, told CNA he got his last dose in January.
He still hasn’t gotten COVID-19 and in his household, only his son has caught the virus, he said.
Asked how he was able to keep himself free from COVID-19 throughout the pandemic, Mr Neo laughed and said in Mandarin, “I’m often at home. I only go out to exercise in the morning, but even then, I don’t wear a mask.”
He added that he “rarely falls sick”, and did not experience any side effects from his previous three jabs, except for a sore spot on the arm that went away “after awhile”.
Also at Hong Kah North CC getting her fourth jab alone was 66-year-old Mdm Ling Geck Hiok.
The retiree was similarly pleased to find a mobile vaccination team near her home, as she would otherwise have to make plans to head to another location in Taman Jurong. The latter, she had heard, was “a bit far” and “a bit crowded”.
Mdm Ling and her husband came down with COVID-19 for the first time last month, after their grandchild picked up the virus in school, but she noted that the experience was just “a bit uncomfortable”.
“Maybe my body is a bit healthier. I rarely fall sick. Even the injections are only a little sore; by tomorrow the soreness will be gone,” she told CNA in Mandarin.
SINGAPORE SITUATION “CALM AND STABLE”
Having already gone through three COVID-19 waves this year, Singapore’s “resilience is high”, said Mr Ong.
But he noted that China’s reopening meant there was “a bit of uncertainty”.
“This (is) bound to drive up infections, which we’re not so worried (about), because our resilience is high and we’ve already gone through three waves this year. But the question is, with 1.3 billion people mostly uninfected and the disease starts to spread, we are bound to get mutations,” Mr Ong said.
“What we worry more (about) is what kind of mutations may come out of China. So that’s what we’re watching.”
Nevertheless, Singapore’s situation at the moment is “calm and stable”, the health minister reiterated.
“Cases are on the low side. Obviously, now coming out the XBB (variant) wave, hospitals are still busy, A&E (accident and emergency departments) especially, but the volume of patients is also lower now. So there’s a sigh of relief. Everything in general is calm.”
It is during this “lull period when things are calm” that senior citizens should get their updated vaccinations, Mr Ong advised.
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