Epidemiologist Suspects More Than One Omicron Case In Indonesia

Illustrations (Irfan Meidianto / VOI)

JAKARTA - The Ministry of Health stated that one case of COVID-19 variant B.1.1.529 or Omicron has been found in Indonesia. Epidemiologist from Griffith University Australia, Dicky Budiman, suspects that there are more than one Omicron transmission in the country.

Because, the first Omicron case in Indonesia was found in the cleaning staff of the Wisma Atlet RSDC. Which, the officer has no history of travel from abroad.

"If this has been detected by workers at the quarantine hotel, it means that there is a high possibility that more than one person who has been quarantined has been exposed," said Dicky when contacted, Friday, December 17.

Moreover, the WHO has stated that the Omicron variant of the corona virus is more infectious than the Delta variant, reducing the vaccine's efficacy, even though the symptoms are not as severe.

Then, the latest research data from Hong Kong states that the Omicron variant reproduces 70 times faster than the Delta variant in the human respiratory tract (bronchus).

"The latest data shows the potential for transmission is extraordinary, much faster than Delta. In a sense, he has 70 times the ability to replicate in the airways than Delta," said Dicky.

Therefore, if the government were to conduct a massive test in the environment where the Omicron case was found, namely Wisma Atlet, Dicky thought it would be better to do it faster.

"Don't wait long. Everything is suspended first, quarantined and checked by PCR. Because what I'm worried about is that these workers go back and forth to their homes and this will be more difficult," said Dicky.

Previously, it was known that the Omicron COVID-19 case had been found in Indonesia. This was announced by the Minister of Health, Budi Gunadi Sadikin, yesterday.

Yesterday, Budi explained that three cleaners at the Wisma Atlet RSDC showed positive results for COVID-19. They were exposed to COVID-19 as of December 8 last.

Then, the janitor's WGS sample was sent to the Balitbangkes of the Ministry of Health on December 10, 2021 to carry out a whole genome sequencing examination.

As a result, one in three cases was exposed to the Omicron variant as of December 15th. They have now returned to PCR and showed negative results.

"There are 3 cleaning workers at the Wisma Atlet RSDC who tested positive for PCR, but one person confirmed positive for Omicron on December 15," Budi said in a virtual press conference, Thursday, December 16.

Budi said the three positive people, including one case of Omicron, had been quarantined at the Wisma Atlet and had no symptoms, had no fever or cough. "They have taken a second PCR, and the PCR results are all negative," said Budi.

Furthermore, Budi said there were also 5 probable cases of Omicron, two cases were Indonesian citizens who had just returned from the United States and England, both of whom were being isolated at Wisma Athletes. Then, foreigners from China who landed in Manado.

"Once again, these five people are still probable because they have just been tested by PCR with special markers and the positive PCR samples from these five probable cases have been sent to Balitbangkes and we are running genome sequencing tests, in the next three days we can confirm whether this is true. is this Omicron or not," he explained.