PMK Outbreak Spreads, Government Will Provide 29 Million Doses Of Foot And Mouth Disease Vaccines

Illustration. (Photo: Doc. Antara)

JAKARTA - Coordinating Minister for Economic Affairs, Airlangga Hartarto, said President Joko Widodo (Jokowi) together with ministers and heads of institutions had held an internal meeting to deal with the Foot And Mouth Disease (FMD) outbreak in livestock. As is known, this epidemic has spread to 19 provinces and 215 regencies/cities in the country.

From the results of the discussion, said Airlangga, it was agreed that there was a ban on live animals, in this case, cows, moving in the red zone. This zone is like the determination of the micro-level red zone during the handling of COVID-19.

Furthermore, Airlangga said, the red zone was based on the sub-district level affected by nail and mouth disease. It is noted that the red zone is in 1,765 sub-districts or 38 percent of the 4,614 sub-districts in Indonesia.

"All the details will be included in the Instruction of the Minister of Home Affairs", Airlangga said in a virtual press conference, monitored from the Presidential Secretariat Youtube, Thursday, June 23.

The former Minister of Industry said that President Jokowi had also approved the procurement of the FMD vaccine. The budget comes from the Chairman of the Committee for Handling COVID-19 and National Economic Recovery (KPC-PEN).

"Then it was also approved for the procurement of vaccines specifically for this year, around 29 million doses, and all of them will be financed with funds from KPC-PEN", said Airlangga.

Then, continued Airlangga, Jokowi has also approved the structure of the Task Force for handling PMK which will later be led by the Head of the National Disaster Management Agency (BNPB) and his representatives, including the Director-General of Livestock and Animal Health, Ministry of Agriculture, the Director-General of Regional Development at the Ministry of Home Affairs, the Deputy for the Coordinating Ministry for the Economy, the Assistant for Operations to the National Police Chief and the Commander of the Indonesian Armed Forces.

"This structure mirrors the handling of COVID-19", he said.

Meanwhile, the Head of BNPB Suharyanto as Head of the FMD Handling Task Force said the FMD Task Force would try to deal with this FMD outbreak as quickly as possible.

Furthermore, Suharyanto said, the government already has a model for handling COVID-19, so the things that are being done while handling COVID-19, which is currently still ongoing, will be applied in handling the Foot And Mouth Disease outbreak.

"Then, of course after this coordination meetings will be held and go to the regions. Especially the red areas, so please from local government officials, governors, regents, and mayors to prepare. So that together we can deal with oral and oral diseases. nails on livestock in Indonesia as quickly as possible", said Suharyanto.