Its another week and on Friday, the world saw a new surge in infections, mostly from a fresh surge in Europe with countries there reporting higher daily cases than the most infected countries. Globally, the total confirmed cases of Covid-19 have reached over 37 million with over 1 million deaths and about 28 million people who have recovered. The United States continues to lead the world with nearly 8 million cases and India is second with around 7 million cases and Brazil follows with about 5 million cases.

Singapore’s cases are not as high as it used to be and we are currently having single digit local or  community cases with the bulk of local cases being from either workers in dormitories or foreign imported cases where travellers test positive on arrival into Singapore. Overall, the number of new cases in the community has remained stable at an average of 1 case per day in the past 2 weeks as well as the number of unlinked cases in the community has remained stable at an average of fewer than 1 case per day in the past 2 weeks. The total number of active cases has been reduced to about 157 now and 57,675 patients have fully recovered from the infection and have been discharged from hospitals or community care facilities. Of the 157 still active cases, about 37 of the confirmed cases who are still in hospital are stable or improving with one in the intensive care unit. Of the balance cases, they have mild symptoms or are clinically well but still test positive for COVID-19 and are isolated and cared for at community facilities.

On the home front, we are all still at home, either working from home or home based learning though there are indications that S may be able to start going back to work on a staggered basis soon and he is quite happy to be going back to office soon, even if it not on a full-time basis. The children have about a week still to go before school starts and they too want to go back, but unfortunately still can’t.

Anyway, this was our week, have a wonderful week people and remember to stay safe and stay masked!

We’re in the last quarter of 2020 and like me, I am sure you too are looking forward to 2021 with the hope that the new year will bring some relief to the world.

The children are still on their holidays, though GG has gotten her timetable for the next semester. Even though Singapore is slowly, but steadily moving towards opening up more, she will continue to be more or less on home-based learning. Her only grouse with the timetable is that she has a class on Saturdays also. She thought she had gotten over Saturday lessons after more than 12 years of Hindi school, but though those were about half day lessons and this is much shorter, it still means she will need to get her act together and be ready by lesson time on the day of the week when she would rather be doing something else.

BB has not heard back anything from school yet, so we don’t know if he will be going back to school or not and if yes, how long. I suspect he will be doing a more hybrid model of studying with some home-based learning and some in-person learning.

The US still continues to lead in positive cases with more than 7.5 million cases as of yesterday, including its President and first lady who were diagnosed late last week, followed closely by India with about 6.5 million cases and then Brazil with abut 4.9 million cases and Russia with slightly over 1 million cases. The four countries together constitute about 58% of the total world cases!

Anyway, here’s to an October which is much better than the September that just went by! Stay safe everybody!

The headline in The Straits Times was a grim reminder of the pandemic with the news that the world death toll will cross a million deaths over this weekend. It was such a sobering reminder to what is happening across the world and according to the World Health Organisation, it is possible that the final tally may even be close to or exceed the 2 million mark. The total infections tally as of yesterday is more than 32 million with the top four countries comprising of the United States, India, Brazil and Russia accounting for nearly 60% of all infected cases.

Many European countries are reporting a second surge which is worrying. India has been reporting the highest daily cases, again another worrying trend. What this pandemic has done to the world economy, most people already know. Economists say the economic repurcussions is about three times as bad as the global financial crisis of 2008 in terms of GDP decline on an annual basis. Though its not as bad as the Great Depression of the 1930s, but it is the worst downturn in the world since then. However, all is not lost. Changes will be made and this will not only accelerate technology adoption and usage, but also a turn towards a more green economy.

In other news, both GG & BB got their first semester results this week. GG did very well and hopefully should continue her good streak. BB on the other hand, did really badly, barely passing all his subjects. Hopefully this is a wake-up call for him and he can work hard for the remaining semesters and pull up his cumulative GPA. Without this kick in the backside, he was getting to be overconfident, so it’s better perhaps that this happened now and not later. He does need to buck up and fast if he wants a place in a local university in the course of study of his choice.

That’s all from us this week. We are going to be in the last quarter for the year and I have to start my planning for 2021 which I hope is a much better year for all compared to 2020. Stay safe people!

And another week is gone. Sometimes it feels that 2020 is rushing by, which is probably a good thing, right, given how this year has turned out. What’s surprising is that this is happening even as most of us are stuck at home.

In Singapore, in the past week, daily cases have been dropping at a steady rate and we are hoping that Phase 3. Currently we are still in Phase 2 which is the phase where there is gradual resumption of activities in a phased manner and Phase 3 will be the new normal which will remain in place till an effective vaccine or treatment course for Covid-19 is developed. I am hopeful that we get into Phase 3 at least by the end of 2020. Also, given the low number of daily cases, I am now feeling slightly hopeful that when school reopens for GG & BB in mid-October, they will go back to school on a full-time basis as opposed to the hybrid model they had in the previous semester.

India on the other hand, is getting worse. Worldwide, the numbers have breached the 30 million mark and India has more than 5 million confirmed cases, behind the US which leads the world at about 6.5 million cases. The daily number of cases in India is also very high, with daily cases reaching close to 100,000 daily and is said to on the course to overtake the US as the country with the highest number of positive cases sooner than later.

Herd immunity is usually brought about by a vaccine or through natural immunity after a sizeable number of people gets infected and then help block the virus spread. Some epidemiologists believe that herd immunity is already taking place in small areas in India where high infection levels have been followed by a weakening of the Covid-19 virus. Others believe that it is too soon to predict or holds little promise. While the concept of natural herd immunity remains untested and even controversial because of the greater risk of mortality, recent Indian sero surveys have indicated that the virus spread is far more than official statistics have revealed in India. A sero-prevalence survey by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) found that India had an estimated 6.4 million infections in May, when official figures at mid-month put the number of positive cases at 85,940. Epidomologists believe that In areas with dense populations, the virus came under control when it reached 55 per cent to 60 per cent of those infected and new case formation reduced considerably. Many of the so called containment areas of the past now produce very little cases.

I just hope and pray things get better in India. When I see and hear about all this, I worry, almost on a constant basis, for my elderly parents who are stuck in Mumbai. They can’t even move out of the city becase of their health. Hopefully things get better in early 2021 and they can move to the retirement community they want to move to soon.

This was our week, hope you all had a better week! Stay safe everyone!

The inevitable has happened! India has now edged out Brazil to have the dubious distinction of being the country with the second highest number of COVID cases. The numbers as of yesterday were more than 4.5 million cases in total, about 3.5 million people who have recovered, slightly over 76,000 deaths and probably close to a million active cases. The US as usual leads the world numbers, but I can see the trend line reducing, while that of India’s is actually increasing. This is seriously worrying. What is more worrying is that my home state of Maharashtra leads the country’s statistics with a total of almost a million cases, which makes almost a quarter of all cases in India from this state. Nearly 700,000 recovered cases, about 28,000 deaths and about a quarter million active cases.

I am not able to get more detailed information for Maharashtra, but I do know that Mumbai is one of the worst hit cities in the country. And it is not surprising, given the large number of migrant workers who come to the city in search of a living and who live in really bad and cramped conditions with little running water or sanitation.

I am sure there are many like me who live outside India and have elderly parents living alone in the country and who are worried sick at the news that comes out daily. My parents, like most of the elderly have other conditions, which an exposure to the virus may excabate. My daily prayer is that my parents get out of this well and somewhat healthy. This is why, even though I don’t really like the idea of them moving out of Mumbai, I am happy that they will finally move to a retirement community once things get better. They plan to stay for a month with an aunt who already lives there and who has offered to host them so they get a chance to get acclimated to the place. Once there, they can also look at options available and buy their own apartment. Then they will come back to Mumbai, wrap up things and move there permanently. This is for their best, in the long run since they will have access to family and friends around as well as a 24-hour medical attention, should the need arise.

In other news, there’s no real news. After about five-six months, BB finally met his besties. They used to be called the three musketeers in school and now that secondary school is over, all three are doing different things. So it’s only during holidays they get a chance to meet up and given the situation this year, they met after a really long time. This is not to say they don’t talk or do do video calls regularly. They do that practically daily and play games together, so they are talking all the time, it’s just they haven’t met each other physically!

That’s about it from us. Stay safe everybody!