Singapore’s lockdown is both blunt, precise

Singapore has suffered a big reversal in its battle against Covid-19. More accustomed to applause than demerits for all but stamping out the virus, the city-state is returning to lockdown-like conditions. Authorities are now scrambling to deploy a mix of scalpels and hammers to contain a recent outbreak. Mastering this balance will be the key to any economic recovery.
The first wave of restrictions were last week. Work from home becomes the default, not long after employees were encouraged to repopulate offices. Eateries are limited to takeout only. Indoor gyms are closed, attendance at worship services is tightened and social gatherings reduced to two, from five previously and eight only a few weeks ago. Then came the blunter instrument: Officials said that most in-school classes would close by midweek.
Leaders cited virulent mutations that attack younger children. They plan to vaccinate kids under 16. (Large portions of the adult population have yet to get shots.) The measures have compromised attempts to restore links to the outside world, critical for an economy dependent on travel.
The World Economic Forum canceled the annual meeting it was planning to hold in Singapore in August, while the air travel bubble between Singapore and Hong Kong has again been postponed.
This all makes for a disappointing lockdown anniversary. One year ago, during Singapore’s two-month “circuit breaker,” we knew relatively little about this disease. Vaccines weren’t available. Contact tracing was in its infancy and masks had only just been made compulsory.
Workplaces had yet to be refashioned for social distancing. Today, inoculations are proceeding, contact-tracing apps and tokens are mandatory, plastic screens are wrapped around office cubicles. Testing is widespread. Few residents expect, let alone attempt, to travel in and out of
the country, given strict quarantine requirements.
Yet Singapore still hasn’t been able to avoid reinstating the tough measures. “We are testing more intensively, and doing our utmost
to ring-fence the transmissions,” Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said in a Facebook post. “But
we also need stricter restrictions to stop more cases from popping up.”
The challenge comes down to an elusive goal of near-total virus suppression and the reality of slow vaccinations — a dilemma that Singapore isn’t facing alone. A handful of Asian governments that initially got high marks for controlling the virus now find themselves reintroducing curbs on activity.
Taiwan, which went without a single domestic case between April and December, asked people to stay home last weekend and imposed limits on gatherings after record new cases.
In Japan, which at first managed to contain the virus while largely avoiding strict lockdowns, economically vital regions are under a state of emergency. Its vaccine rollout ranks among the slowest in the developed world, and Tokyo is under pressure to cancel the Olympics for fear it becomes a super-spreader event.

—Bloomberg