Indonesia Confirm Omicron Cases Reaches 1,600

Jakarta, MINA – Minister of Health Budi Gunadi Sadikin said confirmed cases of Omicron in Indonesia had reached 1,600 cases.

“When compared to the Delta variant, the level of hospitalization (hospital) and the mortality rate of Omicron patients is relatively lower,” Budi said in press statement on Monday.

The Minister of Health said that from the total confirmed cases, as many as two people died and about 20 people needed hospital treatment and oxygen.

“You have to be vigilant and careful because the transmission rate is high, but there’s no need to panic because hospitalizations and deaths are low. We need secondly, ensuring that health protocols are followed, wearing masks, washing hands, reducing crowds,” he said.

To urge discipline in health protocols, the government will publish the level of compliance in implementing health protocols through the PeduliLindung application.

“Earlier, the Vice President at the meeting has also allowed that PeduliLindung data which will measure the discipline of health protocols may be opened to the public so that we can see which locations are disciplined down to the point of location, office, shop, and which are disciplined. So that the community can help control the use of PeduliLindung,” he said.

In terms of surveillance, the Minister of Health emphasized that because of the increasing number of confirmed cases of Omicron, not all cases will be subjected to genome sequencing. Genome sequencing will be more directed to analyze the pattern of distribution of Omicron cases.

“We will use PCR which is much faster, PCR with SGTF (S-Gene Target Failure) which can detect Omicron has been distributed and we will soon add it to be distributed to regions,” he added.

The Minister of Health also asked local governments to remain disciplined in tracking COVID-19 according to the ratio set.

“We hope that the discipline of testing 1:1000 residents per week will continue and we will continue to carry out the isolation strategy at home as well as centralized isolation and hospitals in accordance with existing protocols,” he said.

The Minister of Health added that his party had also provided telemedicine services for COVID-19 patients who were in self-isolation or isoman.

“We’ve seen good results,” he added. (T/RE1)

Mi’raj News Agency (MINA)