VOI - Voice of Indonesia | RRI - Radio Republik Indonesia

The Indonesian Doctors Association (IDI) proposed Simultaneous Covid-19 vaccination to protect all Indonesian citizens against new infections.

The General Chair of the IDI Executive Board, Daeng M Faqih, said it has to be simultaneous because the Covid-19 vaccine only has 6 months to 2 years to protect the body from the virus.

"This vaccine has the power to protect immunity. It is time-bound, so we see at least it can last for 6 months to protect, so this vaccination must be carried out simultaneously," Daeng said in a webinar on Thursday.

"In implementing vaccination, we have discussed that professional organizations such as IDI, PPNI, and Midwives' Association, which usually carry out vaccination activities, will merge to help the Task Force to vaccinate in the field," said Daeng.

Until now, there are three vaccine candidates from the international cooperations that will be used in Indonesia, namely the Sinovac, Sinopharm (G42) vaccine, and the CanSino vaccine.

Minister of State-owned Enterprises Erick Thohir emphasized that those who had the first chance to get the vaccine were health workers, namely doctors, nurses, and midwives.

"We are mapping all health workers, doctors, and nurses who will receive their first immunizations when the vaccine is ready for use early next year and are also at the forefront of mass immunization," Erick said in the press conference.

"Today we consulted with IDI and PPNI, we communicated the number for doctors, nurses, midwives including doctors, nurses in the National Army, National Police, they must get the vaccine first because they are the front liners," said Erick. (RRI)

The Indonesian government pushes the production of personal protective equipment and other medical devices with 100 percent raw materials from Indonesia.

The personal protective equipment met the international standards of AATCC 42 (American Association of Textile Chemists and Colorists) and ISO and ASTM (American Society for Testing and Materials), spokesperson for the COVID 19 Handling Task Force, Wiku Adisasmito said in a press statement on Thursday.

Wiku explained that this step was an effort and policy undertaken by the government in suppressing the spread of COVID 19. He added that other innovations made were making ventilators and cloth masks with the equivalent of surgical masks.

"Second, another innovation is making ventilators made in Indonesia that have been clinically tested well. The third is producing cloth masks, with the same filtration capability as surgical masks and reuseable, and developing domestic vaccines through the Eijkman and Biofarma consortium, namely the Merah Putih vaccine," Wiku said.

Wiku said the government aims to protect the vulnerable, comorbid sufferers, the elderly, including health workers.

Another step that the government will take is to suppress active cases to increase recovery and reduce mortality.
The government also aims to increase the number of testing, tracing, treatment, vaccinations, and increasing the availability of reagents, PCR, and personal protective equipment. (YouTube presidential secretariat / nouva)

The Ministry of Religious Affairs has awarded scholarships to 253 native Papuans to help them pursue undergraduate programs at universities in six big cities.

"We are sending 253 native Papuan youths to pursue their higher education in six big cities in Indonesia," Religious Affairs Minister Fachrul Razi said in Jayapura on Thursday.

Razi said he is keen to see the scholarship awardees complete their higher education and get Bachelor's degrees at least.

After the recipients successfully get their Bachelor's degrees with satisfactory grades, the ministry will offer another scholarship program to help them continue their studies at the post-graduate level.

The Religious Affairs Ministry is implementing the 5,000 Doctoral Degree Program, he added.

ANTARA has earlier reported how the development of human resources remains a tricky challenge for Papua and West Papua, as the human development index scores for the provinces remain low compared to that of other provinces in Indonesia.

On Indonesia's 2019 human development index, the scores of Papua and West Papua were recorded at 64.7 and 60.84 respectively.

At the global level, Indonesia's human development index is lower than in several other countries.

As the world's fourth most populous country, Indonesia is yet to rank among the world's most literate nations.

A 2016 study conducted by John W. Miller, a noted researcher at the Central Connecticut State University (CCSU), ranked Finland, Norway, Iceland, Denmark, Sweden, Switzerland, the United States, Germany, Latvia, and the Netherlands as the 10 most literate nations in the world.

In the study, titled "Literacy achievement tests (Progress in International Reading Literacy Study and Program for International Student Assessment) and literate behavior characteristics (population, newspapers, libraries, years of schooling)", Indonesia had ranked 60th out of 61 countries. It's higher than Botswana, though far behind Singapore, which was placed 36th, and Malaysia, which took the 53rd position.

Miller asserted that a nation's literate behavior contributes to its successes and failures in dealing with the demands of the world's knowledge-based economics. (Antaranews)