VOI - Voice of Indonesia | RRI - Radio Republik Indonesia

Illustration for telemedicine. (ANTARA/HO-Pexel) - 

The government has cooperated with telemedicine platforms and increased isolation facilities in a bid to handle a potential spike in Omicron cases in Indonesia, an official stated.

“The government has partnered with telemedicine platforms and referral hospitals to improve (COVID-19) patients' accessibility to quality health services,” spokesperson for the COVID-19 Handling Task Force Wiku Adisasmito noted in a written statement confirmed here on Friday.

Adisasmito remarked that the health services provided encompass medical consultation and free delivery services for medicines for COVID-19 patients conducting self-isolation at home.

According to the spokesperson, the efforts were made by the government following a significant increase in COVID-19 positive cases in the world in the past two weeks.

This is especially in Indonesia where the number of cases had also increased for two consecutive weeks, from 1,200 to 1,400 weekly cases. The figure even touched almost three thousand cases in the last week, or more than doubled from the previous week.

“On January 12, 2022, an additional 600 positive cases were recorded. Earlier, the number of cases had been successfully curbed in the range of 100-200 additional positive cases per day," he noted.

The number of active cases has also increased consistently. As of January 12, 2022, the number of active cases reached seven thousand, whereas earlier, it was successfully curbed to four thousand active cases.

Due to the increasing number of people testing positive for COVID-19 after traveling abroad, the government had added four isolation hotels in order to increase the isolation bed capacity.

Cumulatively, the arrival of international travelers in Jakarta, as one of the entry points for international arrivals from May 2020 to January 12, 2022, reached 713,222, with the highest trend in the number of arrivals occurring in early January 2022.

"The number of positive cases among (international) travelers reached 200-350 cases per day. Most of them experienced no symptoms and did not need hospital treatment," the spokesperson noted.

To this end, he deemed the existence of additional isolation facilities as being crucial//ANT