Active Cases Of COVID In Jakarta Are Down, But Health Office Suspects Of Little Tracking

JAKARTA - Head of the Epidemiological Surveillance and Immunization Section of the DKI Jakarta Provincial Health Office, Ngabila Salama, said that currently, active cases of COVID-19 in Jakarta decreased by more than 20 thousand cases in the past week.

"Currently, active cases have indeed decreased. The last one was around 90 thousand, now it is at 57 thousand. The trend tends to be gentle," Ngabila said in a virtual discussion, Friday, February 25.

Ngabila said there was a potential for the spread of COVID-19 in Jakarta to decrease. However, Ngabila admitted that her party also suspects a decrease in the number of close contact tracing of confirmed cases or current surveillance.

Therefore, the DKI Health Office will increase efforts to track cases, checks, and treat COVID-19 cases.

"There is a possibility of a decline. But it is still suspected that what is good surveillance is not good. Therefore, we must continue to improve tracing treatment, tracking capabilities," she said.

Along with this, the percentage of positive cases from the number of specimen examinations or the positivity rate also decreased by 11 percent in the past week. However, this figure is still above the reasonable limit recommended by WHO.

"The positivity rate had reached 25 percent. Currently, it is in the range of 14 percent, but it's still above 5 percent as the WHO standard," said Ngabila.

"This is still a concern for all of us. This means that the missing cases in this field are still quite high," she continued.

However, Ngabila revealed that the death rate for COVID-19 cases in Jakarta has not decreased and is actually increasing. Last week, the percentage of deaths was at 0.25 percent and this week it increased to 0.4 percent.

"This death rate is a warning sign that sometimes there are residents who still want to isolate at home. Even though they are elderly and have comorbidities," she added.