SINGAPORE, Feb 9 — With the Covid-19 situation stabilising and causing minimal disruption to healthcare capacity and daily life, the Republic will lower the Disease Outbreak Response System Condition (Dorscon) from yellow to green from Feb 13.

The multi-ministry task force heading Singapore’s pandemic response will also be stood down, task force co-chair Lawrence Wong said on Thursday (Feb 9).

With this, the Health Ministry (MOH) will assume management of the Covid-19 situation and will reactivate an "appropriate multi-agency crisis management structure” should the situation worsen significantly, the ministry said in a press release.

Reflecting on the past three years, MOH said that Singapore has engaged in a long campaign against Covid-19 and has emerged as a more prepared, resilient, and united nation with one of the lowest Covid-19 death rates in the world, and thanked healthcare workers and all those who contributed to Singapore’s pandemic response.

Said the ministry: "We have been reviewing our experience in grappling with Covid-19 over the last three years. We will learn from this experience, so that Singapore can be prepared to respond to future pandemics.”

Responding to a question about the review at a press conference, Mr Wong said the after-action report is not meant to "congratulate ourselves”.

"It is really meant to take an objective look at what has transpired over the last three years. Areas that we have done well we should acknowledge, areas that we could have done better we should also highlight... primarily with the view to see what we can do better when the next pandemic strikes,” said Mr Wong, who is also the Finance Minister.

The Dorscon level was first raised from green to yellow in end-2019 when the coronavirus appeared globally. Singapore raised it again to orange as unlinked Covid-19 cases started to crop up across the island.

The change prompted significant changes to daily life immediately, such as the suspension of inter-school and external activities within schools and requiring temperature screening and close controls of entry points at hospitals.

The lowering of Singapore’s Dorscon to green on Feb 13 will end a 297-day period of Dorscon yellow.

MOH said it will continue to monitor Singapore’s healthcare capacity, and if there are signs that our healthcare capacity is becoming strained or a new and more dangerous variant has emerged, the Dorscon level may be revised.

"There may be a need for the population to urgently receive boosters to ensure that we remain protected. Should this happen, we seek the support of everyone in Singapore to rally together again as we have over the past three years to overcome any new threat,” said the ministry.

Dorscon provides Singapore with general guidelines on what it needs to do to prevent and reduce the impact of infections, taking into account four key things, according to Gov.sg:

• The situation overseas

• The transmissibility of the disease

• How likely the disease is to arrive in Singapore

• What impact the disease might have on Singapore

What do the colours mean?

Dorscon first appeared in Singapore’s National Influenza Pandemic Preparedness and Response Plan, which was created following the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (Sars) outbreak in 2003.

The framework presently has four colours — green, yellow, orange and red — that signals the extent of risk faced by the community.

Across all levels, individuals are recommended to be socially responsible by staying home if sick, maintain good personal hygiene, and keep a lookout for health advisories.

Green: Negligible public health impact

This means that the disease is mild, or that it is severe but does not spread easily from person to person.

At this level, there is minimal disruption to daily life. For example, border screenings may be heightened and travel advice may be issued.

Yellow: Low-moderate public health impact

The yellow alert — which Singapore is currently at due to the Covid-19 situation — is used if the disease is severe and spreads easily from person to person but is occurring outside of Singapore, or if the disease is spreading in Singapore is typically mild or being contained.

A typically mild disease would be only slightly more severe than seasonal influenza, but could be severe in vulnerable groups, said Gov.sg. Daily life would also be minimally disrupted, such as having additional measures at border and healthcare settings, and having higher absenteeism in workplaces and schools.

Orange: Moderate-high public health impact

The disease must be severe and spreads easily from person to person, but has not spread widely in Singapore and is being contained at the orange alert. One example of such disease is Sars, or severe acute respiratory syndrome, which infected 238 people of which 33 died in 2003.

Unlike the green and yellow alerts, daily life is moderately disrupted during a period of Dorscon orange. Beyond temperature screenings and visitor restrictions at hospitals, quarantines are to be expected among other measures. Members of the public would also be expected to comply with control measures, noted Gov.sg.

Red: High public health impact

Red, the highest level, is called if the disease is severe and spreading widely.

This would also mean major disruption to daily life such as school closures and work from home orders. There also would be a significant number of deaths.

Social distancing would also be in place, with the public advised to avoid crowded areas.

While some measures classified under the red alert were implemented in Singapore when it upped the Dorscon level to orange in 2020, the red alert was never used.

This is because the red alert means there are "uncontrollable outbreaks” and widespread community transmissions making contact tracing, containment and quarantine extremely difficult, said then-Health Minister Gan Kim Yong on April 3, 2020.

How Dorscon status changed during the pandemic

Prior to Covid-19, Singapore raised the Dorscon status from yellow to orange on April 30, 2009 for Influenza A, also known as H1N1.

Although there had been no H1N1 cases locally, the World Health Organisation had raised the pandemic alert for it, suggesting that there was a human-to-human spread of the virus into at least two countries in one region.

The orange alert lasted for just 11 days after H1N1 was found to be milder than originally feared, MOH said in a press release on May 10, 2009.

For the Covid-19 pandemic, Singapore remained in Dorscon orange for two years.

This is a timeline of Dorscon status changes due to Covid-19:

• End 2019: As cases of Covid-19, then commonly referred to as Sars-CoV-2, causing severe disease and death emerged in Wuhan, Singapore raises its Dorscon level to yellow

• Jan 23, 2020: Singapore confirms its first Covid-19 case after a China national tests positive

• Feb 7, 2020: Singapore raises its Dorscon status from yellow to orange after local Covid-19 cases without links to previous cases or travel history to China start emerging. There are 33 Covid-19 cases in Singapore.

• March 26, 2020: Rumours that the Government will raise the Dorscon alert to red are quickly shut down by then-Communications and Information Minister S Iswaran. Dorscon remained at orange.

• April 26, 2022: The Government lowers the Dorscon level from orange to yellow, signalling that Covid-19 spreading in Singapore, but is typically mild or being contained.

Why are the Dorscon levels being reviewed?

Nevertheless, the colour-coded framework that signals Singapore’s crisis management plan is not well-understood by the public. When the Republic raised its Dorscon level from yellow to orange in Feb 2020 in response to the rise in local Covid-19 cases, several members of the public reacted by mass buying groceries, such as toilet paper, from the supermarket.

Mr Wong, who co-chairs the team leading Singapore’s response to Covid-19, previously attributed the supermarket runs to a "misunderstanding” and "a lack of clarity” of the Dorscon system, which was intended to signal the current crisis management plan.

A week after the alert was adjusted, then-National Development Minister Lawrence Wong said that "misunderstanding” and "lack of clarity” about the risk assessment alarm level prompted the mass purchasing of daily essentials.

This incident has prompted MOH to review the Dorscon framework, Health Minister Ong Ye Kung said in Parliament last May.

He said that the colour-coded indicator was, after all, meant to bolster preparedness, rather than "induce public anxiety.

Mr Ong did not give any details on what the reformed Dorscon framework might look like. — TODAY