COVID-19 Task Force Finds Health Protocol Compliance Decreases During Christmas And New Year Holidays

JAKARTA - The COVID-19 Handling Task Force has seen a decrease in compliance with health protocols in public places during the Christmas and New Year 2021 holidays. This monitoring is recorded in the United Against COVID-19 application.

The Head of the Data and Information Technology Division of the COVID-19 Handling Task Force, Dewi Nur Aisyah, said that this monitoring was carried out on 1,181,512 people in 342,493 tourist attractions in 436 districts / cities throughout Indonesia from 24 December 2020 to 3 January 2021.

"Christmas and New Year holidays fall on Thursday and Friday. In fact, the trend of compliance with health protocols has indeed decreased compared to the previous week," said Dewi in a YouTube broadcast of BNPB Indonesia, Wednesday, January 6.

There are two aspects to be monitored, namely the use of masks and maintaining distance. From last week, the use of public masks was 82 percent. On the exact Christmas and New Year holidays, namely Thursday and Friday, there was a decrease to 81 percent.

Meanwhile, in the aspect of maintaining distance, there was also a decrease from 80 percent of the people who kept their distance to 77 percent on Christmas and New Year holidays.

However, on the Saturdays and Sundays after Christmas and New Years, it increased again. "So, when they see the risk of transmission more on Saturdays and Sundays, they become more compliant with health protocols," he explained.

Previously, President Joko Widodo (Jokowi) also highlighted the decreasing number of community compliance in implementing health protocols. This was conveyed in a limited meeting of the COVID-19 Pandemic Handling and the Vaccination Implementation Plan at the State Palace, Jakarta.

"From the survey we conducted, currently there is less disciplinary motivation towards public health protocols. Wearing a mask, maintaining distance, washing hands is reduced," said Jokowi.

So, he asked the governors who attended the meeting to pay more attention to the issue of decreasing the discipline of health protocols. Do not let the incidents that occur in a number of other countries such as Japan, England, and Thailand that have to carry out regional quarantine or lockdown because an increase in cases has actually occurred in Indonesia.

"Therefore, we must work hard, work really hard so that 3T and 3M can be done in the field, once again in the field," he said.