Coronavirus: Singapore religious groups cancel worship services as clusters emerge
- Sites of worship have been encouraged to air their services online following two clusters seen at churches
- Some temples stopped short of axing services, but ramped up the cleaning of common areas and urged those feeling unwell to stay at home
Other religious organisations such as Buddhist and Sikh temples are stopping short of scrapping regular services, but choosing to implement more stringent precautionary measures at places of worship – urging those who are unwell to stay at home, as well as to ramp up cleaning of facilities and common areas.
On February 14, the Catholic Church in Singapore announced it would suspend all public Masses indefinitely due to the coronavirus outbreak.
The heightened measures come as several confirmed cases of the Covid-19 disease were linked to churches in the past two weeks – the Grace Assembly of God church and the Life Church and Missions Singapore.
Both churches have stopped all meetings.
One of the latest confirmed patients had also attended Mass at the Catholic Church of Christ the King in Ang Mo Kio, the Ministry of Health (MOH) said on February 14.
While announcing the suspension of Mass in a pastoral letter signed by Archbishop William Goh, the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Singapore said that temperature-taking “is not a foolproof screening tool” because persons who are asymptomatic can also be carriers of the infection.
