JAKARTA - BPJS Watch Advocacy Coordinator Timboel Siregar reminded the government to provide massive education regarding the emergence of a new subvariant from the Omicron COVID-19 called XBB.
"This is what the government needs to explain to the public, what he is and then how to overcome and his attack power," he said when contacted, Tuesday, October 25.Timboel said, if the XBB variant of COVID-19 is a subvariant of Omicron, it is likely that his attack power will be weak even though the transmission power is faster. However, if the variant is new, he reminded the government needs to carry out careful prevention mitigation. Like the Delta variant at that time we were not too aware, in the end he entered and attacked and became a crucial problem at that time, such as oxygen was lacking and so on," he said. through appropriate and thorough education, he continued, the public could be more aware of the potential transmission of the XBB variant of COVID-19, including preparedness in health facilities.
He also reminded the public to continue to apply a healthy lifestyle and always wear masks when doing activities outside the home
"Don't let us consider this variant weak or so, but explain how, it has happened in which area, which country, how the attack power is," he said.
Spokesperson for the Ministry of Health (Kemenkes) M. Syahril revealed that the first case of COVID-19 XBB in Indonesia was a local transmission. The XBB variant was detected in a 29-year-old woman who recently returned from Lombok, West Nusa Tenggara.
"There are symptoms such as cough, runny nose, and fever. He then carried out an examination and tested positive on September 26. After undergoing isolation, the patient was declared cured on October 3", said Syahril.Following these findings, the Ministry of Health rushed to make anticipatory efforts by testing and tracing 10 close contacts. As a result, all close contacts tested negative for the XBB variant of COVID-19. Syahril explained that although the new variant of XBB spreads quickly, the fatality was no more severe than the Omicron variant.
He also again appealed to immediately vaccinate against COVID-19, including for people who have not received a booster vaccine.
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