SINGAPORE — The risks of people becoming seriously ill or dying from Covid-19 is at least eight times higher for non-fully vaccinated people than fully vaccinated people, the Ministry of Health (MOH) said on Thursday (Oct 28), as it explained a new chart that it has introduced in its daily update of Covid-19 cases.

“We understand that there have been some questions about the effectiveness of the Covid-19 vaccines in reducing the risk of serious illness. To address this, we introduced a new chart in our Covid-19 press release earlier this week,” the ministry said in a Facebook post.

The new chart, which has been included in the daily updates since Monday, shows the seven-day moving average of the number of deaths, as well as those who are critically ill and intubated in intensive care units. The chart includes the breakdown of cases who are fully and non-fully vaccinated.

“By calculating the seven-day moving average of critically ill cases and deaths per 100,000 population, we can see that the risks of non-fully vaccinated cases becoming seriously ill or dying is at least eight times higher than that of fully vaccinated cases,” MOH said.

The ministry added that the risk is higher for those aged 60 and above.

Associate Professor Kenneth Mak, director of medical services at MOH, said during a press conference by the national Covid-19 task force last Saturday that an unvaccinated patient has a 10.4 times higher risk of being placed in an intensive care unit or dying compared to a vaccinated patient.

The relative risk of dying from Covid-19 is also 11.7 times higher for an unvaccinated patient.

“The evidence is clear: Vaccination protects you. Please get your Covid-19 vaccination and booster dose, and encourage others to do so too,” the ministry said in its post.