Covid-19 exacerbated the nursing shortage in Singapore, with a higher than usual number of foreign nurses leaving during the pandemic, the health minister said.

Singapore has seen a boom in concerts since pandemic lockdowns ended, with big names like Blackpink, Coldplay and Ed Sheeran playing sold-out shows.

Instead of tightening rules, the government is likely to issue more advisories on hygiene, mask wearing and precautions for vulnerable groups, experts say.

The city state will also open a second Covid treatment facility to deal with the rising infections that topped 56,000 last week.

The goal is to slow the spread of a variety of germs, as a confluence of Covid, flu and other respiratory pathogens may set off wider outbreaks that ultimately stretch healthcare systems.

The health ministry said Covid-19 hospitalisations and ICU cases had shot up in recent weeks.

Ranked the best in the world, Changi airport has crossed the milestone figure for the first time since pre-pandemic levels.

Not ‘out of the woods completely … it’s ‘still a half full, half empty kind of situation’, economist says.

Residential rents in Hong Kong and Singapore remain close to parity after the gap shrank dramatically over the past five years, signifying the diverging fortunes of the rival Asian financial hubs, official data compiled by property consultancy CBRE showed.

Singapore’s Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong had tested positive again on June 1 due to a ‘Covid-19 rebound’.

Lee said he feels fine, adding doctors told him that it was a post-Covid rebound.

The city state reported 54 deaths last month, nearly double of the total number recorded in the first quarter.

The PM said he has been prescribed the antiviral medication Paxlovid because of his age, adding that his most recent booster shot was in November.

The city state’s flag carrier reported net income of US$1.62 billion for the year ended March 31, after posting losses for the past three years.

Annual projected losses could hit US$11.8 billion for Singapore and US$13.8 billion for Hong Kong if Covid-19 infections were to worsen, the report said.

Although China has eased its strict pandemic restrictions, it has not resumed the ability for Singaporeans to visit the country visa-free for 15 days.

Government hospital bed occupancy rate has gone up in Malaysia, while the Philippines reopened its Covid wards to tackle rise in infections.

Only 28 per cent of children aged five to 11 have ‘minimum protection’ against the disease, according to the city state’s Health Ministry, as weekly Covid case numbers top 27,000.

In his annual May Day message, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said there is hope inflation will let up in the second half of the year and that retrenchment numbers ‘remain manageable’.

Newton David Christopher, who wanted to enter Australia, paid the doctor and his logistics supervisor US$4,498 to administer saline instead of a Sinopharm vaccine.

The surprise ‘draconian’ rate hike – one of the harshest tightening moves in recent years – will impact some 10 per cent of private property transactions.

Mr Koh Choon Lim is suspected to have suffered an allergic reaction to Lianhua Qingwen Jiaonang traditional Chinese medicine pills, which are not approved by Singapore’s health authority to treat or alleviate symptoms of Covid-19.

Stallholders of the historic Muslim tradition in Southeast Asia, can’t compete with cheaper Chinese e-commerce products and the challenge of soaring rents.

Filipino Ontal Charlene Vargas died of myocarditis, or inflammation of the heart. A coroner ruled it was likely related to the vaccine she had received.

Daily infections went up from about 1,400 a month ago to around 4,000 cases a day last week.

The wave is being attributed to a mix of XBB subvariants – a highly transmissible Omicron strain that, so far, isn’t causing widespread severe illness.

Disney Cruise Line announced it would exclusively base a new cruise ship in Singapore for five years.