What we know about Covid-19 deaths among younger adults in Singapore

SINGAPORE - The 23-year-old and 34-year-old Singaporeans reported on Thursday (Oct 14) to have died of Covid-19 complications were among the youngest deaths in Singapore.

Neither was fully vaccinated, and both had multiple pre-existing health conditions, the Ministry of Health (MOH) said.

Checks by The Straits Times found that this was also the case for most of the other deaths from Covid-19 involving younger adults here.

Before Thursday, the youngest person who died of complications due to the virus in Singapore was a 34-year-old man from Ukraine.

The sea crew member died on Aug 1 after arriving on board a vessel on July 29.

MOH said he developed a fever, cough and lethargy on July 25, and breathlessness on July 31, but did not give further details about his vaccination status or whether he had pre-existing conditions.

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Two others below the age of 50 have died of Covid-19 complications in Singapore to date.

One was a 41-year-old man from China who had recovered from the illness.

On June 4 last year, about two weeks after he was discharged from hospital, he collapsed and died. This was before vaccines became available here in December last year.

The coroner determined his cause of death to be massive pulmonary thromboembolism following the infection.

This refers to a condition where a large blockage, often a blood clot, obstructs blood flow through the pulmonary arteries in one's lungs.

The other was a 44-year-old permanent resident who died on June 21 this year. MOH said he had not been vaccinated against Covid-19 and had a history of diabetes.

Of the four people in their 50s who died of Covid-19 before Sept 29, none had been vaccinated.

MOH changed the format of its daily updates on Sept 29 and stopped giving detailed information about every case.

After that, there were at least four other deaths of those in their 50s. Of those, all had pre-existing conditions, two were partially vaccinated, one was unvaccinated, and the vaccination status of the fourth person is unclear.

The vast majority of the patients who have died of Covid-19 in Singapore had one or more pre-existing conditions.

Just eight were reported to have had no such conditions.

For another 13, most of whom died in 2020, MOH did not report whether or not they had pre-existing conditions.

High blood pressure and high cholesterol were by far the most common known pre-existing conditions among the 207 Covid-19-related deaths reported by the MOH since the outbreak began.

The two conditions were also often reported in the same patient.

Other common conditions included diabetes, heart disease, kidney disease and cancer.