Singapore continues with its seafarer vaccination program

UNDER a tripartite alliance led by the Singapore Shipping Association (SSA), at least 12,000 doses of COVID-19 vaccine will be made available to sea crew onboard oceangoing vessels calling Singapore from 15 November 2021-30 June 2022.

For the next phase of SEAVAX will be undertaken by the Shipping Tripartite Alliance Resilience (STAR) Taskforce, an international tripartite alliance led by the SSA.

The Port of Singapore started vaccinating foreign sea crew, starting with resident foreign sea crew under the Sea-Air Vaccination Exercise (SAVE) since April 2021, and more recently non-resident foreign sea crew under the Sea Crew Vaccination (SEAVAX) Initiative since August 2021.

More than 8000 foreign sea crew have received at least one dose of vaccination in Singapore, of whom 90% have been fully vaccinated, comprising some 2860 non-resident foreign sea crew.

Singapore will also continue to facilitate crew change together with the shipping community so that sea crew need not work beyond their contract duration or can sign on ships to work.

Since March 2020, Singapore has facilitated close to 190,000 crew changes. This is expected to reach 200,000 before the end of December 2021. As part of facilitating crew change in a safe manner, the STAR Taskforce has also developed a CrewSafe audit program with more than 30 accredited facilities in crew source nations with quality control checks to crew change processes across quarantine, medical, and testing facilities.

Kitack Lim, secretary-general of the International Maritime Organization said, “I welcome with appreciation the continuing efforts of Singapore to support crew change during the COVID-19 pandemic and to vaccinate seafarers including foreign seafarers calling at Singapore.

“Initiatives like this strengthen my belief that we will be able to overcome the crew change crisis and safeguard the health and well-being of our seafarers as we strive to overcome the COVID-19 pandemic.”

SSA president, Caroline Yang said, “The SSA-led STAR Taskforce audited more than 30 facilities in the Philippines, India, Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore, enabling crew change to facilitate global trade amid the global pandemic.

“We are heartened that our continued efforts to champion the wellbeing of our seafarers have made progress with wider groups of eligible sea crew arriving in Singapore able to be protected against the COVID virus.”