Covid-19 crisis Bus interchange clusters of infection
I wish to share my views about the infections at the bus interchange. 

The total infected people has increased to 469 as at 5 September 2021.

This is low as compared to the number of trips taken by passengers during the past week. Prior to the pandemic, there was 5 million trips a day. Currently, I estimate that the number probably dropped to 2 million trips a day or 14 million trip for the past 7 days.

I suspect that most of these cases are from bus captains that are tested regularly and were found positive in the test. The virus is probably mild, as most captains are probably vaccinated and are well.

Based on the above reasons, I would conclude that there is no need to worry about the clusters from the bus interchanges. 

It is possible that some of the infected people are passengers who have fallen sick and were discovered to be infected by covid. 

They are sent for treatment in community care facilities or in hospitals. Most are discharged after a few days as having recovered. 

A very small number goes for oxygen supplementation or ICU care.  This number remains very low at less than 30. They come from all sources (not from the bus clusters alone).

I now deal with the risk of being infected while traveling in the buses. This risk is currently very low. We have only 469 cases, out of an estimated 14 million trips.  

I take a bus regularly. I observed that the bus captain wear a mask and does not talk. The passengers also wear a mask and are seated or standing at more than 1 meter from the captain. The risk of transmission is low.

Even if the virus is transmitted through the air conditioning system, I expect the virus to be mild. 

If the risk is much higher than my hypothesis, we would have several tens of thousands of cases now, instead of 469 cases. 

Tan Kin Lian
 

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