COVID-19 Bed Occupancy Drops 1 Percent In A Day, Ministry Of Health: This Gives Hope

JAKARTA - There has been a decrease in the national-scale COVID-19 bed occupancy rate of about 1 percent in one day amid the increase in COVID-19 cases due to the spread of the Omicron variant.

As of February 8, the bed occupancy ratio (BOR) of referral hospitals in Indonesia was 23.86 percent. Previously on Monday, February 7, the occupancy reached 24.77 percent.

Director of Prevention and Control of Directly Infectious Diseases of the Ministry of Health (Kemenkes) Siti Nadia Tarmizi said this showed improvement in the handling of COVID-19 in Indonesia.

"From the hospital data we received nationally as of 15.30 WIB (February 8), the number is less than the hospital data the day before. This gives hope," said Nadia in her statement, Wednesday, February 9.

Currently, the government is indeed trying to reduce the COVID-19 BOR number by prioritizing the treatment of COVID-19 patients with moderate, severe, and critical symptoms. Meanwhile, asymptomatic cases and mild symptoms are advised to isolate at home.

Based on records as of Sunday, February 6, of 58 patients with severe symptoms who were treated at the Ministry of Health's vertical hospital, 60 percent of them had not received a complete vaccination.

Then, it was noted that 356 patients died, 42 percent had comorbidities, 44 percent of deaths were elderly, and 69 percent of deaths had not been fully vaccinated.

Therefore, said Nadia, the selection of patients to be prioritized for treatment needs to be done in order to prevent the fatality rate of COVID-19 patients.

"We can continue to ease the burden on hospitals and health workers to effectively treat patients with moderate, severe, critical symptoms, and those with comorbidities," said Nadia.

"We estimate that by encouraging asymptomatic (OTG) and mild symptomatic patients to self-isolate and centrally isolate, it will reduce the hospital burden by 70%," he continued.