Dealing With Omicron BA.4 And BA.5, Epidemiologist Suggests Elderly And Healthcare Workers To Be Injected With Fourth Dose Of COVID-19 Vaccine

Illustration of a COVID-19 vaccination. (Unsplash)

JAKARTA - Epidemiologist from Griffith University Australia, Dicky Budiman, asked the government to accelerate the third or booster dose of COVID-19 vaccination in order to mitigate the spread of the Omicron BA.4 and BA.5 subvariants.

"In the context of B4 B5 mitigation, we must accelerate or accelerate the third dose," said Dicky Budiman via voice message, Thursday, June 16.

In fact, he said, vulnerable groups such as the elderly and those with comorbidities or comorbidities also need to be given the fourth dose after three or four months of receiving the third dose of vaccination.

"Some cases that are quite vulnerable have the potential to be given a fourth dose, especially the elderly with comorbidities and so on, or perhaps health workers. This can also be learned from the experiences of other countries," he said.

In general, according to him, the Indonesian people have sufficient immunity capital with two doses of vaccine.

"Even though they have protection, they can still get infected," he said.

Meanwhile, based on Antara's report, the COVID-19 Task Force reported that the total number of Indonesians who had received injections of the COVID-19 vaccine for booster doses reached more than 48.2 million as of Thursday, June 16, at 12.00 WIB.

The number of people who have received three doses of the COVID-19 vaccine has increased by 231,267, bringing the total to 48,269,992.

In percentage terms, the injection rate of booster doses of the COVID-19 vaccine has been given to 23.17 percent of the total population targeted for the COVID-19 vaccination, amounting to more than 208 million people.

Meanwhile, the population who received two doses of the COVID-19 vaccine had reached 168,251,795 people or equivalent to 80.78 percent, while the recipients of the first dose reached 201,000,560 people or the equivalent of 96.5 percent.