Ministry Of Health: 90 Percent Of COVID-19 Cases Are Currently The Omicron Variant

ILLUSTRA TION BY VOI

JAKARTA - Secretary of the Directorate General of Disease Prevention and Control of the Ministry of Health, Siti Nadia Tarmizi, said that currently 90 percent of the existing COVID-19 cases are the Omicron variant.

This is done by examining whole genome sequencing (WGS) taken randomly from samples of COVID-19 cases.

"We extrapolated the conditions in the area from the results obtained that 90 percent of them were Omicron cases. So, the type of variant circulating in the area is assumed to be caused by the Omicron case," said Nadia in a virtual press conference, Tuesday, February 22.

Nadia said that currently not all positive cases of COVID-19 were not tested for the coronavirus variant.

"This variant case finding is carried out only by random samples taken from positive cases, to find out what types of variants are circulating from this random sample," she said.

So far, the Ministry of Health has detected a total of 5.227 Omicron cases, of which 1.879 cases were foreign travel agents (PPLN) and the rest were local transmissions.

Meanwhile, University of Indonesia epidemiologist Pandu Riono said cases of the Omicron variant of COVID-19 could indeed spread quickly but the symptoms were mild.

According to him, people do not need to go to the hospital if they are tested positive, whether they are asymptomatic or have mild symptoms.

"Indonesian people have been traumatized by the previous Delta variant of the COVID-19 wave. It should be noted that this Omicron variant spreads quickly, but cases of illness and death due to this variant are low," said Pandu some time ago.

The characteristics of the spike in cases, he said, were strongly influenced by the characteristics of the virus variant. In addition, the characteristics of the spike in cases are also influenced by the number of residents' immunity.

"That's why people often misperceive current conditions such as the conditions in July-August 2021, even though they are far different," he said.