The Government Prepares IDR 445 Trillion To Overcome The Impact Of The COVID-19 Pandemic This Year, The Health Sector Is Still A Priority

JAKARTA - The government through the Ministry of Finance is known to have budgeted IDR 455.62 trillion to overcome the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic this year which is summarized in the National Economic Recovery (PEN) program.

The Director-General of Budget at the Ministry of Finance, Isa Rachmatarwata, said that one of the focuses would be on efforts to transform the health sector.

"The government continues to improve health facilities and infrastructure, efforts to reduce stunting rates, and other policies", he said in the Budget Goes To Campus (BGTC) webinar on Thursday, February 24.

According to Isa, the dynamics of the development of COVID-19 cases with the emergence of various variants provide extraordinary lessons. He said that this condition was accompanied by a new approach to producing a more efficient, effective, and faster way of working.

“The pandemic has caused a kind of crisis condition, both in the health sector and in socio-economic life. It should be remembered that in every crisis there are valuable lessons to be learned”, he said.

To note, the 2022 PEN program is divided into three main clusters, namely health care with an allocation of IDR 122.54 trillion, community protection IDR 154.76 trillion, and economic strengthening IDR 178.32 trillion.

Meanwhile, this year's PEN is lower than the realization in 2021 which amounted to IDR 658.6 trillion or 88.4 percent of the IDR 744.77 trillion ceilings.

Meanwhile, for the 2020 period, the total PEN budget that was absorbed was IDR 575.8, or equivalent to 82.83 percent of the allocation of IDR 695.2 trillion.

This year's PEN budget, which is relatively sloping, is due to the ongoing process of economic recovery. The assumption of a reversal of the situation has even been shown through the amount of Indonesia's gross domestic product (GDP) in 2021 which has exceeded the pre-pandemic (pre-covid) level.