Avoid non-essential travel to Singapore, Cabinet Secretary Rajiv Gauba advises amid coronavirus scare

Union Cabinet Secretary Rajiv Gauba on Saturday advised citizens to avoid non-essential travel to Singapore after he took stock of the situation at a high-level meeting here on the coronavirus outbreak.

"Citizens are advised to avoid non-essential travel to Singapore," Gauba said.

Apart from this the central government is now also planning to start universal screening at airports for flights from Kathmandu, Indonesia, Vietnam and Malaysia along with those from other countries.

This universal screening will be in addition to those already being conducted as per the earlier advisories.

There have been 86 recorded cases of coronavirus in Singapore till February 22, although there have been no recorded deaths in the country, according to media reports.

"As on date, 21,805 passengers have been brought under community surveillance. In addition, 3,97,152 flight passengers and 9,695 travellers at sea ports have been screened," an official release said.

The meeting was attended by the Secretaries of Health and Family Welfare, Civil Aviation, Defence, Information and Broadcasting, DG AFMS and representatives from External Affairs, Home Affairs, Bureau of Immigration, ITBP and Army.

The novel coronavirus, COVID-19 first originated in the Chinese city of Wuhan and has since killed more than 2,200 people in that country alone, while cases have been reported in several countries across the world, including India.