Rizieq Shihab Gathered Pickup, COVID-19 Task Force: All People Should Have Concern

Rizieq Shihab arrives at Petamburan (Photo: Irfan Meidianto / VOI)

JAKARTA - The crowd to pick up the Grand Imam of the Islamic Defenders Front (FPI), Rizieq Shihab, received attention from various parties. Moreover, epidemiologists assess that the crowd that occurs when the crowd picks up Rizieq has the potential to create a new cluster for the spread of COVID-19.

In response to this, Wiku Adisasmito, spokesperson for the Task Force (Task Force) for handling COVID-19, asked all parties to have concerns about the COVID-19 pandemic. Because, this virus is not visible and those who are infected often do not show any symptoms.

"I urge all elements of society to have concerns that we are still in a state of the COVID-19 pandemic," Wiku said in a press conference broadcast on the Presidential Secretariat YouTube account, Tuesday, November 10.

"COVID-19 is an invisible virus and a disease caused by an invisible virus. So not everyone has symptoms at the time of exposure," he added.

He asked the public to adhere to health protocols to prevent COVID-19, namely wearing masks, maintaining distance, and washing hands. This should be done by everyone without exception.

This is because if the public does not carry out this health protocol they have the potential to contract a virus that can attack anyone.

"Negligence or indifference to these conditions as well as to health protocols can endanger human lives," he stressed.

"Not only ourselves but our families at home and also people around us," he said.

Previously reported, the mass to pick up the Grand Imam of the Islamic Defenders Front (FPI) Rizieq Shihab who crowded at Soekarno-Hatta Airport during the COVID-19 pandemic was in the spotlight of an epidemiologist from Australia's Griffith University Dicky Budiman.

Seeing the large number of people who gathered without heeding the health protocols for preventing COVID-19, such as maintaining distance and wearing masks in the crowd, he considered that it was very possible that a COVID-19 cluster would occur later.

"Every dense crowd like that, such a crowd where conditions are not yet under control is indicated by a national positivity rate which is still above 10 percent including in Jakarta, not yet five percent and we do not know where it has come from, yes, of course this. It is very possible that there will be a cluster, "said Dicky to VOI, Tuesday, November 10.

If in the future there are parties who argue that after the crowd was not found clusters, he then reminded that the cluster of the spread of COVID-19 was not absent but undetectable due to low testing. "So (crowding, ed) this is not a safe thing, no," he said.

He said the low intervention against COVID-19 through testing to tracking cases after a crowd like this would also have the potential to cause an explosion of high cases in the community. Moreover, in today's society, many viruses spread through people without symptoms.

This then makes the curve in Indonesia instead of flattening out even higher.

"Because the 3T (Tracing, Testing, Treatment) and 3M (Washing Hands, Keeping Distance, and Wearing Masks) interventions do not synergize to be able to hit," he said.

It is known, Rizieq arrived in Indonesia after 3 years in Saudi Arabia. Rizieq Shihab was greeted by a crowd of pick-ups who filled the Terminal 3 area of Soekarno-Hatta Airport. Judging from the live streaming of Front TV's YouTube account, Rizieq Shihab returned to Indonesia with his family. Meanwhile, the pick-up crowd filled all sides of the arrival terminal area from the international route.

There were also lines forming a fence to make way for Rizieq Shihab from terminal 3 of Soekarno-Hatta Airport.

The crowd to pick up Rizieq Shihab had been moving since early this morning. It was reported that there was a total traffic jam towards Soekarno-Hatta Airport this morning.

Prospective passengers even reportedly had to walk about 1 kilometer because the vehicle could not move. Apart from crowding around the airport, the crowd was also at the residence of the FPI High Priest in the Petamburan area, Jakarta.

They also held zikir, salawatan, and prayed for Habib Rizieq's safety while on the way.