Bad News From Airlangga: COVID-19 Cases Have Reached A Yellow Light, Micro-Based Community Activity Restrictions Continues Until June 28

JAKARTA - Coordinating Minister for Economic Affairs Airlangga Hartarto revealed that based on the trend of increasing bed occupancy ratio (BOR) or isolation beds (TT) and ICUs, especially in the four main provinces on the island of Java, the government will immediately increase the capacity of approximately 30-40 percent.

This capacity addition will be carried out through the Ministry of Health together with the local government (Pemda) and will be evaluated again over the next week.

Previously, in a limited meeting with the President on Sunday, June 13, the Head of State called Airlangga asked the central and regional levels to strengthen cooperation in efforts to control the increase in COVID-19 cases.

Continuing what has been directed by the President, Coordinating Minister Airlangga as Chair of the PC-PEN Committee, in addition to reminding the importance of testing, tracing, and implementing isolation, also emphasized the need to strengthen the implementation of Micro-Based Community Activity Restrictions (PPKM).

"The Micro-based PPKM will be extended for June 15-28, 2021 (Phase X), and in the regulation of Restrictions on Community Activities, it must take into account the development of Regional Risk Zoning in each region", said Coordinating Minister Airlangga in a press statement, Monday, June 14.

The government will also accelerate the implementation of Genome-Sequencing to track potential transmission of the new variant of the coronavirus, and also encourage the acceleration of the realization of the 2021 National Economic Recovery Program (PEN) in the Health Cluster, especially those related to the Diagnostic (Testing and Tracing) program.

"The implementation of the Micro-Based Community Activity Restriction (PPKM) will be continued by extending Phase X which will take effect from June 15-28 2021, in accordance with the Instruction of the Minister of Home Affairs which is in the process of completion", he said.

For information, since the end of the Eid holiday, there has been an increasing trend of COVID-19 cases, which is marked by an increase in daily confirmed cases in four provinces on the island of Java, namely DKI Jakarta, West Java, Central Java, and East Java.

"This increase in COVID-19 cases must be controlled immediately, and not to interfere with the economic recovery efforts that are currently being rolled out", said Airlangga.

As of June 13, 2021, daily confirmed cases increased by 9.868 cases. When compared with the average data a week earlier, confirmed cases rose by 27.32 percent, active cases increased by 3.97 percent, death cases rose by 7.92 percent, and the number of patients hospitalized also increased by 24.5 percent.

DKI Jakarta experienced the highest increase in cases with more than 300 percent, of which on June 1, 2021, daily cases were only 519 cases, while as of June 12, 2021, daily cases reached 2.455 cases.

The number of COVID-19 patients being treated at various hospitals in Indonesia has an increasing trend as well. Since May 21, 2021, 23.221 patients have been recorded and this has increased to 41.073 patients on June 12, 2021.