Deputy Minister Of Health: The Increase In COVID-19 Cases Is Not Significant, There Is No Need For Restrictions On Mobility

Deputy Minister of Health Dante Saksono Harbuwono said the government assessed that the increase in COVID-19 cases in Indonesia was not significant, so there was no need to impose restrictions on community mobility.

"Restrictions on mobility restrictions are still not too significant," said Deputy Minister of Health Dante when met after the plenary cabinet meeting at the Presidential Palace complex, Jakarta, reported by ANTARA, Monday, December 11.

Despite saying the spread of COVID-19 is still under control, Dante encourages people to be vaccinated.

"Now we still have 4.1 million doses of vaccine that people can still use," he said.

Regarding complaints from people who have difficulty getting the COVID-19 vaccine in health facilities such as health centers, Dante said it was caused by the distribution process.

The Ministry of Health noted that daily cases of COVID-19 in Indonesia increased by 35-40 cases as of December 6, 2023, with the number of patients being treated in hospitals recorded at 60-131 people.

This situation triggers the hospital's current occupancy rate of 0.06 percent and the death rate of 0-3 cases per day.

The increase in cases is dominated by the Omicron XBB 1.5 subvariant which is also the cause of a wave of COVID-19 infections in Europe and the United States. In addition, EG2 and EG5 subvariants were also detected.

Despite the increase, the cases are still much lower than during the pandemic which reached 50,000-400,000 cases per week.

In DKI Jakarta, 80 positive cases of COVID-19 were found between November 27 and December 3, 2023.

Of the 80 cases, 90 percent had mild symptoms, while the remaining 10 percent had moderate symptoms and were undergoing treatment at the hospital.

The DKI Jakarta Health Office also recorded two deaths from being positive for COVID-19 in December 2023 in Jakarta after not finding such a fatal impact during October-November.

Director of Prevention and Control of Infectious Diseases of the Ministry of Health (Kemenkes) Imran Pambudi appealed to the public to return to the discipline of wearing masks following the finding of pneumonia cases in DKI Jakarta.