The government has lost the balance

I received this feedback from Mr. Fong Dear Tan, While many had applause the government for the CB measures. I think that the government has lost the balance. https://tklcloud.com/Feedback/feedback2.aspx?id=2972

Protect the elderly people from the virus

At long last, the ministers are now paying to the residents of nursing homes and the care workers.

https://www.channelnewsasia.com/…/covid-19-testing-nursing-…

I guess that they are preparing to remove the circuit breaker from the general population and focus the attention with the elderly population.

I have advocated this strategy all along. I find the circuit breaker to be unnecessary, unwise and wasteful. I find the extension of the circuit breaker to be "insane".

https://tklcloud.com/Feedback/feedback2.aspx?id=2971

High number of covid-19 cases in America

America has the highest number of cases and deaths of covid-19 among all the countries in the world. It has 1.3 million cases and 78,000 deaths as at 8 May 2020. Why is the number so high? https://tklcloud.com/Feedback/feedback2.aspx?id=2970

WOTC - Lower death rate

Wisdom of the Crowd. 41% of the respondents said that the death rate is lower in Singapore because of excellent medical facilities. 37% said that the virus is less lethal in warm weather.

https://tklcloud.com/Crowd2/chart.aspx?ID=1966

WOTC - Extension of circuit breaker

Wisdom of the Crowd: 51% of the respondents said that the circuit breaker should NOT be extended beyond 4 May. 49% said it should.

https://tklcloud.com/Crowd2/chart.aspx?ID=1966

South Korea prepares for second wave

Coronavirus: South Korea bracing for 'inevitable' second wave

https://www.straitstimes.com/…/coronavirus-south-korea-brac…?

TKL comments. I am afraid that a second, third and subsequent wave is inevitable. It is very difficult to contain the virus.


It is better to adopt a strategy to protect the vulnerable population, i.e. the elderly and those with underlying medical conditions.

See here:
https://tklcloud.com/Feedback/feedback2.aspx?id=2966

Wisdom of the Crowd - New Issues

1. Will Singapore face a challenge in creating jobs for locals?

Vote in
https://tklcloud.com/Crowd2/vote.aspx

The negative aspect of lockdown

Many governments implement lockdown to stop the spread of the covid-19 virus. It may be the wrong strategy. It may make the pandemic more serious. Why? https://tklcloud.com/Feedback/feedback2.aspx?id=2966

WOTC - Encourage locals to take the jobs now done by foreigners

Wisdom of the Crowd: 58% of the respondents want the government to improve the wages and working conditions to encourage locals to do the jobs now done by foreign workers. 42% want to continue to use foreign workers for these jobs.

https://tklcloud.com/Crowd2/chart.aspx?ID=1965

WOTC - Improve the living conditions in the worker dormitories

Wisdom of the Crowd: 72% of the respondents said that we should reduce the overcrowding of the worker dormitories. 20% said that the hygiene should be improved.

https://tklcloud.com/Crowd2/chart.aspx?ID=1964

Wisdom of the Crowd - New Issues

1. Should we reduce reliance on foreign workers?
2. Should we continue the segregation between locals, PR and foreigners?

Vote in
https://tklcloud.com/Crowd2/vote.aspx

WOTC - Compulsory to wear face mask

Wisdom of the Crowd: 46% of the respondents support the decision to make wearing of face masks mandatory. The other 52% have a different opinion.

https://tklcloud.com/Crowd2/chart.aspx?ID=1963

WOTC - Biggest blunder by ministerial task force

Wisdom of the Crowd: 52% of the respondents said that the biggest blunder made by the ministerial task force is failing to deal early with the transmission in the foreign worker dormitories. 33% said that it is the delay in calling for the use of face masks.

https://tklcloud.com/Crowd2/chart.aspx?ID=1962

Are we paying for the cost of relying too much on foreign workers?

To answer this question, I like to estimate the cost of the relief measures caused by the economic downturn and more specifically the circuit breaker measures.

https://tklcloud.com/Feedback/feedback2.aspx?id=2957

Containment of Covid-19 Spread

I sent this letter to the two ministers who co-chair the task force two week ago. I sent them a reminder after a week. They did not acknowledge or reply on both occasions.

Maybe, they were already checked into IMH (institute of mental health). Hahaha.
https://tklcloud.com/Feedback/feedback2.aspx?id=2956

Creating jobs for Singaporeans after the pandemic

The Singapore economy will be transformed.

The global economy in the future will have less global trade. Most countries will manufacture a bigger proportion of their products at home. This will affect Singapore badly. There will be less global trade and the need for financial services. Many of the well paying jobs in the past will disappear.

How can Singaporeans, especially the younger ones, find jobs in the future?
https://tklcloud.com/Feedback/feedback2.aspx?id=2955

Wisdom of the Crowd - New Issues

1. Will international travel and tourism recover after the pandemic is over?
2. How will the covid-19 pandemic be eradicated?

Vote in
https://tklcloud.com/Crowd2/vote.aspx

WOTC - Teleconferencing

Wisdom of the Crowd: 52% of respondents are not familiar with the use of teleconferencing. For the remaining 48%, more than half prefer to use Zoom over the other platforms.

https://tklcloud.com/Crowd2/chart.aspx?ID=1961

WOTC - Most popular teleconferencing platform

Wisdom of the Crowd: 60% of respondents are willing to use Zoom for teleconferencing. The other 40% prefer to use other platforms.

https://tklcloud.com/Crowd2/chart.aspx?ID=1960

Will international travel and tourism recover after the pandemic?

The pandemic will be over by mid 2021 or earlier. It may die off naturally or a vaccine will be found.

It is likely that international travel and tourism will resume.

But I do not expect it to return to the level that occurred prior to the pandemic. Here are my reasons:

http://tklcloud.com/Feedback/feedback2.aspx?id=2951

Quora: What do you think of Trump saying that the U.S. is going to seek compensation from China over COVID-19?

Kevin Randolf, Self Employed, answered

What for?

The truth, and that's what any court outside the USA looks at, is that the USA had as much warning and probably more than everyone in the world and yet failed to respond indeed it played politics and lied to its population about the seriousness of the pandemic, taking no real steps to address the issue until 8 weeks after most of the world!

The USA also had at least 12 personnel within the WHO during the entire progress of this outbreak!

However I would suspect that Iraq's people have a rock solid case against the USA for the 2nd Iraq war and subsequent theft of it's oil assets amongst other things!

This is backed up solid evidence and even confessions!

We all know that America considers itself above the law anyway so nothing will happen, hell if you're American you can drive on the wrong side of the road in a foreign country and kill someone and your government will help you escape!

So I hope you'll excuse the world when it doesn't agree with America, yet again, refusing to take responsibility for it's own actions and continually blaming others!

Your credibility is zero!

Changing to a new lifestyle

The circuit breaker caused people to work from home and children to use home based learning. People also get familiar with ordering food to be delivered to the home.

After the pandemic, I expect the following change to the lifestypes in Singapore.
https://tklcloud.com/Feedback/feedback2.aspx?id=2947

Wisdom of the Crowd - New Issues

1. Do you support the extension of the circuit breaker?

2. Will Singapore's economy recover after the circuit breaker?

Vote in
https://tklcloud.com/Crowd2/vote.aspx

WOTC - Home based earning

Wisdom of the Crowd: 63% of the respondents said that the students find it difficult to carry out home learning.

https://tklcloud.com/Crowd2/chart.aspx?ID=1958

WOTC - Working at home

Wisdom of the Crowd: 68% of the respondents like working at home for office based jobs.

https://tklcloud.com/Crowd2/chart.aspx?ID=1959

Bring manufacturing back home

After the pandemic, I see many countries will try to bring manufacturing back to their home countries. They will want to shorten the supply chain. It will be reverse of globalization that has happened during the past three decades. 

This move will be driven by two factors. One is the need to create jobs in the home country. The other is to have security in the supply of essential products.

There will be greater emphasis on the security of food supplies. Many countries will build their agriculture. Governments will create stockpiles for food staples that has to be grown in other countries.

Businesses will still reply on overseas supplies for some of their raw materials. They will have to build inventories of their raw materials to prevent a disruption of supplies. For essential products, a bigger inventory will be required.

Governments are also likely to create stockpiles of essential materials and food.

To make local manufacturing viable, countries will have to implement tariffs on imports. We will see a return to a higher level of protectionism. World trade will reduce to some extent, but not totally. 

In the new economic order, I see more protectionism, less globalization, building of stockpiles of essential products, less world trade. 

Singapore will be badly affected by these trends, as we provide logistic services and have a small home market. We will have to adjust to the changes ahead. 

https://tklcloud.com/Feedback/feedback2.aspx?id=2946

Expansion of isolation facilities

I wish to give credit to the ministerial task force for the speed in which they have expanded the isolation facilities for people who are tested positive for the covid-19 virus.

They have already added 18,000 beds within a short time and plan to add another 23,000 beds by the end of June. See report.

This was useful to accommodate the recent spite in cases, most of which are found in the foreign worker dormitories.

My friend, who is a skeptic, said that this is not an outstanding achievement. It does not require highly paid ministers to arrive at this decision or to oversees its execution. He said that many other countries have also responded in this manner. We only need to follow their lead.

My friend also pointed out that many ordinary people have suggested earlier to expand the facilities. These people are not as highly paid as the ministers.

I do not want to argue against my friend, the skeptic. So, I will give credit to our highly paid ministers for their good response.

I do criticize the ministers for their bad judgment in many aspects of their handling of this crisis, especially with the costly and unnecessary circuit breaker. That is a separate issue.

I have put up several dozen posts on the handling of the covid-19 crisis over the past two months. See here. My approach is different from the ministerial task force on many issues. I will leave it to history to judge whether the ministerial task force had acted correctly.


https://tklcloud.com/Feedback/feedback2.aspx?id=2945