How are Denmark and Singapore’s living with covid-19 strategy playing out?

After more than 18 months into the pandemic living with strict covid-19 restrictions, several countries with high vaccination rates are testing ways to open up and adapt a “living with covid-19” model. 

In a recent article, Citizen Digital mentions Denmark and Singapore, amongst others, as countries to watch closely for how their strategies play out. 

Denmark has been known as the country that declared precautions over when the Danish government on 10 September lifted all remaining covid-19 restrictions. Denmark declared that covid-19 was no longer “an illness which is a critical threat to society” with enviable vaccination rates of over 74 percent as part of the country’s success.

According to Denmark’s Health Minister Magnus Heunicke, the pandemic is continuing to decline, and “the vaccines and all citizens in Denmark’s great efforts over a long period are the basis for us to do so well,”.

Despite such optimism, as the Danish government announced the planned end date for restrictions, Magnus Heunicke noted, “Even though we are in a good place right now, we are not out of the epidemic. And the government will not hesitate to act quickly if the pandemic again threatens important functions in our society,” he said.

In June, Singapore announced a plan to move toward a “living with covid-19 strategy” but the rapid spread of the Delta variant is not helping the country’s strategy. According to the plan, outbreaks would be controlled with vaccines and monitoring hospitalizations rather than restricting citizens’ lives and at the time, Singapore’s top Covid-19 officials stated that “the bad news is that Covid-19 may never go away but the good news is that it is possible to live normally with it in our midst”. 

While authorities began the easing of some restrictions for fully vaccinated people, the rapid spread of the Delta variant however put that strategy under strain and Singapore’s further reopening was paused.

Despite reporting the country’s highest one-day Covid-19 case total in more than a year earlier this week, the number of people falling seriously ill remains low thanks to vaccination, authorities said. 

Singapore has one of the highest Covid-19 vaccination rates in the world, with 81 percent of the population fully vaccinated so far, Citizen Digital writes.