Ministry presses for intensifying booster vaccination coverage before Christmas

Jakarta (ANTARA) - The Coordinating Ministry for Human Development and Culture emphasized the importance of increasing the coverage of booster vaccination ahead of the Christmas and 2023 New Year holidays.

“The community and stakeholders must actively participate in increasing the coverage of COVID-19 booster vaccination,” the ministry's deputy for the coordination of health quality improvement and population development, Agus Suprapto, noted when contacted on Thursday.

In addition, he highlighted that the community needs to strengthen the implementation of health protocols to prevent a spike in COVID-19 cases, as the people’s mobility will likely increase during the Christmas and New Year holidays.

He noted that the finding of cases of the XBB subvariant of COVID-19 in Indonesia had become a reminder that people's compliance with health protocols and vaccination still had to be strengthened.

"The strengthening of health protocols is direly needed amid the emergence of the new subvariant of COVID-19, the XBB subvariant," he remarked.

He further stressed that the pandemic had not ended yet, so everyone must make efforts to prevent the spread of COVID-19.

"It is important for the whole community to remember that the greatest responsibility for preventing the spread of COVID-19 is on each of us," he said.

Meanwhile, Government spokesperson for COVID-19 Handling Wiku Adisasmito noted that as of October 23, 2022, the increase in positive cases in a single week had globally reached 2.98 million cases.

"The emergence of the XBB subvariant of COVID-19 in several countries is predicted to cause another surge in cases," he said.

According to Adisasmito, various experts from the United States and WHO noted that the XBB subvariant can cause a spike in cases in late 2022 and may peak in January 2023. However, there is no evidence that the subvariant is more dangerous than the previous subvariants.