Opinion | Hong Kong vs Singapore: a look at the Covid-19 numbers that truly matter
- On the surface, amid the fifth wave, Hong Kong’s coronavirus case data still looks much better than Singapore’s
- It bears noting, however, that the overall death rate has remained the same for Singapore and its recent high caseload has not caused panic
When the Covid-19 pandemic first reared its ugly head, governments responded with different policies. In Singapore, right at the start, pandemic policy was made very clear. Our economy depends on us being an open society, and at the same time, the lives of citizens are important. We therefore promoted masking, social distancing, contact tracing and quarantining of infected individuals.
Hong Kong chose a different path. Quite rightly, as part of China, the city has stuck with the zero-Covid approach, while the push for vaccination was not as aggressive as in Singapore.
The zero-Covid policy was highly successful for about two years, and even in the midst of a fifth wave, Hong Kong’s data still looks better than Singapore’s. According to Our World in Data, in terms of cumulative infections per million population, as of March 4, Hong Kong had 53,368 cases while Singapore had 147,313.
In terms of cumulative deaths per million, as recently as at February 23, Hong Kong’s was 50.97 to Singapore’s 176.58. It was only recently that Hong Kong’s number leapfrogged Singapore’s – becoming 205.75, to 195.65 as of March 4.
In any pandemic, it is notoriously difficult to judge the real number of infections or deaths due to the disease. People might go undiagnosed, or people dying from some other disease but testing positive for the pandemic disease could be labelled as having died from that disease.