S’pore Confirms First Wuhan Virus Local Transmissions, 4 Cases Involve Lavender Shop Selling Health Products

2 Of The 4 Locally Transmitted Wuhan Virus Cases Worked At Lavender Health Shop

After 2 days of zero new cases, the Ministry of Health (MOH) announced a bumper crop of 6 cases of people in Singapore infected with the virus.

The total number stands at 24 as of Tuesday (4 Feb).

4 cases related to health product shop off Lavender Street

Of the 6 new cases, 4 centre around a health product shop off Lavender Street at Cavan Road, and MOH confirmed that they caught the disease locally.

According to Channel NewsAsia (CNA), the 19th and 20th cases are salespeople who work at the Chinese health products shop Yong Thai Hang. The 21st case is the helper of the 19th one.

Source

As for the 24th case, she was a tour guide who visited the shop. Here’s a breakdown of the cases.

• 19th case: A 28-year-old woman developed a sore throat and fever on Wednesday (29 Jan). She was admitted to Tan Tock Seng Hospital emergency room the next day, though a chest X-ray showed that she didn’t have pneumonia. On Mon (3 Feb), she went to Singapore General Hospital (SGH) after staying at home since 31 Jan.
• 20th case: A 48-year-woman living at Hougang Street 61 is Singapore’s 20th case. She showed symptoms of the disease on 25 Jan and was admitted to the National Centre for Infectious Diseases (NCID).
• 21st case: The 19th case’s helper, classified as the 21st case by MOH, also caught the virus and developed symptoms on 2 Feb. The 44-year-old Indonesian didn’t leave her house until being admitted to SGH on Monday.
• 24th case: The 32-year-old, classified as the 24th case by MOH, was a tour guide leading a group of Chinese tourists. She displayed no symptoms when visiting the National Centre for Infectious Diseases (NCID).

The group apparently visited Yong Thai Hang on Thursday (23 Jan) as well as other destinations, before leaving for Malaysia on 24 Jan.

They eventually returned to Singapore on 27 Jan and left from Changi Airport Terminal 1 at 6am that day.

The 20th case lives at Hougang Street 61
Source

2 other cases are Singaporean evacuees from Wuhan

As for the remaining 22nd and 23rd cases, we learnt that they were among 92 passengers who were evacuated from Wuhan on 30 Jan.

They did not show any symptoms of illness when they got on the flight.

After touching down, both were quarantined right away. In spite of the fact that they still showed no symptoms, they were tested positive for the coronavirus yesterday (3 Feb).

They’re now isolated and warded at NCID.

4 cases are not proof of community spread

Despite this latest development, health authorities declared that the 4 cases of local transmission are not proof of community spread in Singapore.

This is because all of them can be linked back to recent travellers from China. Some of them even had close contact with each other.

It is only when authorities are unable to detect the source of transmission, that Singaporeans will be alerted of it.

Featured image adapted from Google Maps.