COVID-19 In The World Rises Again, The Highest Increase In Cases Is In Indonesia

JAKARTA - Spokesperson for the COVID-19 Task Force, Wiku Adisasmito, said that currently the world's COVID-19 cases are increasing again, after maintaining a long decline in cases. Wiku said Indonesia was the country with the highest increase in cases.

"Developments in each country can be different due to the characteristics and patterns of controlling COVID-19 in that country. If sorted by the percentage of the highest weekly positive case increase, Indonesia is the one with the most significant increase," Wiku said in a virtual press conference, Friday, July 1.

Wiku explained, COVID-19 cases in Indonesia increased by 620 percent within 28 days, Bangladesh rose 500 percent in 22 days, England rose 380 percent in 23 days, Italy rose 241 percent in 25 days, Germany rose 209 percent in 22 days, Singapore up 116 percent in 18 days, Malaysia up 49 percent in 19 days, and the United States up 14 percent in 8 days.

"This is an important concern because with the increasing number of cases in these countries. This means that we need to be vigilant again and this proves that COVID-19 still exists," said Wiku.

In Indonesia, continued Wiku, over the past few days, daily cases were above 2,000 cases. However, the increase in cases that occurred after the Eid holiday this year was much smaller than last year.

From May to June 2021, there was an increase of more than 200 thousand cases, from 153 thousand to 356 thousand cases for 2 months. This figure peaked in July 2021 for a total addition of more than 1 million cases during July 2021.

The good news is that the increase in cases during the last month of this year was only around 23 thousand cases, from 8 thousand cases in May to 31 thousand cases in June.

Wiku said that although the current rate of increase in cases was not greater than the number at various peak cases that had been passed, Wiku said that transmission still needed to be suppressed immediately so that it did not increase.

"We need to be aware of this because this is a school holiday period and tends to increase people's mobility to tourist spots. In addition, community activities of course also increase ahead of Eid al-Adha," he added.