Indonesia Claims Pandemic Under Control Despite Relaxations

TheIndonesia.co - Spokesperson for COVID-19 vaccinations at the Health Ministry, Siti Nadia Tarmizi, has said that the COVID-19 situation in Indonesia has remained under control despite the relaxation of several restrictions.

"The relaxation of activities (restrictions) in almost all provinces has, in fact, (caused) no significant increase in cases," she noted at a press conference on ‘COVID-19 Vaccine Dynamics,’ which was accessed from here on Monday, April 25, 2022.

With the start of this year's Ramadan, the government decided to allow people to travel to their hometowns after a gap of two years, she said.

On April 25, 2022, the nation recorded 317 confirmed cases of COVID-19, Tarmizi added.

This marked a drastic decline compared to the peak of the Omicron wave, which was capped at 61 thousand cases, or even the Delta wave, which claimed many lives, she said.

During the same period, 33 deaths were reported in the country. In comparison, the highest death toll recorded during the Omicron surge was 2,200.

Further, the national positivity rate is currently less than 1 percent, or 0.52 percent, and the occupancy rate at hospitals as of April 23 was only 3 percent of the total existing capacity.

"Another thing which (we must pay attention to) is that the reproduction number of the virus has tended to continue to fall to less than 1. Of course, it is an indicator that this pandemic is under control," Tarmizi pointed out.

The current conditions are still the same as in September–December 2021, when the pandemic was under control, she added.

Indonesia has managed to keep the rate of positivity below 1 percent over the course of 3 to 3.5 months, she highlighted.

The nation should be grateful that, in terms of control over the COVID-19 pandemic, it has fared somewhat better than other countries, including Southeast Asian countries, Tarmizi said.

"If we look at Malaysia, it still recorded 4 thousand cases per day on April 24, Singapore had 2 thousand cases per day, and Thailand had almost 15 thousand cases, and Australia had 33,700 cases," she pointed out.