Many Regions Lack Vaccine Stocks Because The Government Prioritizes Big Cities

The spokesperson for the COVID-19 Task Force, Prof Wiku Adisasmito gave a press statement in Jakarta (Photo: Presidential Secretariat Press Bureau/Lukas via covid19.go.id)

JAKARTA - A number of areas outside major cities admit that they lack stock of COVID-19 vaccines. The dwindling availability of vaccines has hampered the implementation of the national vaccination program in regions.

Spokesman for the COVID-19 Task Force, Wiku Adisasmito, admitted that currently the government is sorting out the distribution of vaccines to prioritize areas with a high risk of COVID-19 and experiencing an increase in cases, such as in big cities.

"So far, vaccination is still prioritized for vulnerable areas and populations, and in parallel pursuing broad national coverage," said Wiku in a virtual press conference, Tuesday, August 3.

However, said Wiku, the government is committed to accelerating vaccine coverage, one of which is through joint vaccination campaigns between the TNI and Polri to ensure maximum and timely distribution.

"The government has also made a number of efforts to increase the number of vaccine doses from abroad to be sent to Indonesia and accelerate the conversion process of bulk vaccines into ready-to-inject vaccines," he said.

Some time ago, Health Minister Budi Gunadi Sadikin also admitted that the government had given more vaccines to Java and Bali. This is because the current COVID-19 death rate in areas that implement PPKM Level 4 is quite high.

The priority for distributing vaccines to this area, said Budi, was carried out as an intervention to suppress the spread of cases and prevent the high death rate of COVID-19 cases.

"Please understand. Indeed, until June we only received about 22 percent of the total vaccine we need. So if the area has been vaccinated about 20 percent, it's roughly the same as the national one," said Budi.

However, Budi targets that there will be more vaccine stocks from August to December. So that, by the end of this year, the implementation of vaccination can be more spread throughout the region.

"From August to December there will be more than 300 million doses of vaccine. It is time for us to work hard together to carry out this vaccination," he said.

It is known, as of August 3, there have been 48,106,208 people who have received the first dose of COVID-19 vaccination and 21,436,908 the second dose of vaccination. Meanwhile, the target for vaccination in Indonesia is 208,265,720 people.