Amid Fluctuations In COVID BA.4 And BA.5, Deputy Minister Of Health Dante Says PTM Policy Needs Holistic Decisions

JAKARTA - Deputy Minister of Health, Dante Saksono Harbuwono, said the face-to-face learning (PTM) policy in the midst of fluctuating COVID-19 cases requires holistic decisions through coordination between ministries and institutions.

"It does require extensive coordination. Coordination of how this is decided holistically", he said after attending the agenda for the Handover of Presidential Decree No. 65/P of 2022 concerning the Dismissal and Appointment of Interim Substitute Members of the BPJS Kesehatan Supervisory Board at the Coordinating Ministry for Human Development and Culture Building Jakarta, Antara, Monday, July 18.

He said that currently there was a slight increase in COVID-19 cases in Indonesia, one of which was in DKI Jakarta. The increase in cases in the last few days was accompanied by more massive case tracking and testing in the community.

"In terms of the increase in cases, there is a slight increase, but we remember that the increase in cases increased slightly, and the testing was small. We also found a lot of testing", he said.

Dante said that the COVID-19 cases found in the community were generally subvariants of Omicron BA.4 and BA.5 which had mild symptoms and a low hospital occupancy rate (BOR), so people need not worry.

"This symptom is also mild (mild), for mild symptoms there is not too much worry and the hospital numbers are also few and not too worried, compared to the Delta case", he said.

The daily trend of the COVID-19 rate in Indonesia began to show a decline on Saturday, July 16 which reached 4,329 confirmed COVID-19 patients. That number decreased on Sunday, July 17 to 3,540 confirmed positive patients and today it fell again to 3,393 positive confirmed cases.

Previously, Minister of Health Budi Gunadi Sadikin said the COVID-19 pandemic situation in Indonesia, based on transmission indicated by the World Health Organization (WHO), was still relatively better than other countries.

"The WHO standard is at the level of 7,800 cases per day. So as long as it is below that level, the WHO standard is still at level 1", he said.