Bio Farma: Those Who Were Injected With The COVID-19 Vaccine Were Medical Personnel

Capture the screen of the Director of Bio Farma, Honesti Basyir. (Mery Handayani / VOI)

JAKARTA - Bio Farma (Persero) as the holding of a pharmaceutical BUMN, revealed that the COVID-19 vaccine made by a Chinese pharmaceutical company, Sinovac, which has entered Indonesia, will be prioritized for health workers or health workers.

President Director of PT Bio Farma Honesti Basyir said that health workers will be injected with the COVID-19 vaccine after an emergency use authorization (EUA) from BPOM is issued.

"For the initial stages of vaccines that will enter and also have entered, health workers will be prioritized," he said, in a virtual press conference, in Jakarta, Tuesday, December 4.

Honesti hopes that the presence of the COVID-19 vaccine for health workers can provide security and protection to those who are directly dealing with positive patients with the virus.

"Currently, the government is trying to provide protection to health workers and those who are at the forefront or frontliners by providing the COVID-19 vaccine," he said.

Honesti explained that the government has prepared a total of three million doses of the COVID-19 vaccine from Sinovac. Of that total, 1.2 million doses of vaccine arrived in Indonesia on Sunday, December 6. Meanwhile, the remaining 1.8 million doses will arrive at the end of this year.

Furthermore, Honesti said, the vaccine that had just arrived in the country was a vaccine ready for injection in a single dose package.

"The total vaccines we received were 1,200,568 vials (packs). Of which 568 vials were allocated for quality testing by PT Bio Farma and the POM," he said.

As is known, the holding company of the pharmaceutical SOE Holding PT Bio Farma was selected as a Potential Drug Manufacturer by the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations for COVID-19 (CEPI).

This is a continuation of the due diligence results on September 15, 2020, which provided an assessment of aspects of the vaccine production system and its quality, laboratory analytic systems, and information technology systems used by Bio Farma in producing vaccines.

CEPI is a public-private and philanthropic coalition, based in Norway, with the aim of tackling the epidemic by accelerating the development of its vaccine. One of the founders of CEPI, namely the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.