Indonesia’s Jokowi Wants Increased Testing, COVID-19 Transparency

Indonesia’s president on Monday called for greater transparency and increased rates of testing amid the coronavirus pandemic, after his government was criticized for not being forthcoming about the extent of the outbreak in Southeast Asia’s most populous nation.

The government has been the target of complaints that President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo and other officials downplayed the seriousness of the COVID-19 pandemic during their initial response to the public health threat.

“The numbers of patients under monitoring, people under monitoring, positive cases, recoveries, deaths and rates of CPR testing, should be made available openly so that everyone can access the data properly,” Jokowi told members of his cabinet. “These should be updated every day in a more integrated way.”

Jokowi said PCR (polymerase chain reaction) tests to detect COVID-19 infections should be ramped up by adding more labs – 29 now from just three in early March. Only 26,500 tests have been done to date.

“I want PCR tests to be expanded to reduce queues in areas where there are COVID-19 outbreaks,” he said.

“This is good progress, but what I want is for us to be able to test more than 10,000 a day,” Jokowi said without elaborating on a time frame for such testing.

On Monday, Indonesian authorities confirmed 316 new cases of the coronavirus disease, bringing the nationwide total to 4,557 cases. The daily death toll rose by 26 to 399, officials said.

Outside of China, Indonesia remains the country in East Asia with the highest number of fatalities from the outbreak. More than 116,000 people have died and at least 1.8 million have been infected worldwide, according to the latest data compiled by disease experts at Johns Hopkins University in the United States.

Back in February, when no cases had been officially detected, Health Minister Terawan Agus Putranto said that no one had been infected by the virus in Indonesia thanks to prayers. He urged people to “just enjoy” things.

In mid-March, Jokowi said his government was deliberately holding back some information on COVID-19.

“We did not disclose some information to the public because we did not want to stir panic. We have worked hard to overcome this,” Jokowi said at that time.

The government has also been criticized for low rates of testing, with health experts expressing fears that the number of positive cases was much higher that official figures suggested.

New restrictions

The Ministry of Health, meanwhile, has approved proposals to institute large-scale social restrictions for regions bordering the capital city, Jakarta, over the next two weeks, officials said.

The greater Jakarta area, which includes the cities of Bogor, Depok, Tangerang and Bekasi, is home to 30 million people.

Jakarta officials imposed the same measures on April 10, banning gatherings of more than five people and ordered residents to stay at home.

The measures call for closing schools, places of worship and businesses except for establishments providing essential goods and services including grocery stores, pharmacies and telecommunications. Violators could face fines of up to 100 million rupiah (U.S. $6,378).

The health ministry rejected proposals for similar measures for Palangkaraya, the capital of Central Kalimantan province, and Sorong in West Papua province, citing a lack of epidemiological justification because there were no widespread outbreaks in the regions.

Prisoner unrest

Elsewhere in Indonesia, authorities in North Sulawesi said that a riot at a prison in Manado on Saturday might have been sparked by fears of the spread of COVID-19 among inmates. Parts of the prison were burned during the riot.

A prisoner died of a heart attack after the riot, North Sulawesi correctional official Edy Wardoyo told local media.

“The source of the problem is still being investigated, but it could be because of recent measures to fight COVID-19,” said Nugroho, director general of corrections at the Law and Human Rights Ministry. He referred to the recent release of 30,000 inmates nationwide who had served two-thirds of their sentences to ease pressure on prisons during the virus outbreak.

He said the inmates who rioted might have wanted to be released too, even though they were not eligible.

Eighteen drug inmates suspected of inciting the riot were to be moved to a high-security prison complex on the island of Nusakambangan off the coast of Java, said the director of correctional security at the ministry, Tejo Harwanto.

Bangladeshi leader boosts outreach packages

Meanwhile in South Asia on Monday, Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina announced that her government was setting up a special fund to support health workers and other frontline workers combatting COVID-19 as part of economic stimulus and social outreach packages that now total more than U.S. $11 billion.

“[I have] already instructed officials to make a list of public sector health workers who have directly served coronavirus patients and they will be given special allowance,” Hasina said in a national address Monday night. “Funds amounting to 1 billion taka (nearly U.S. $11.8 million) will be allocated for them.”

“We are going to introduce insurance for doctors, nurses, health workers, local level administrative officials, members of law enforcement agencies and the armed forces, members of the BGB (Border Guard Bangladesh) and other public servants who have directly been involved in fighting the coronavirus,” she said.

In addition, the government is going to allocate 7.5 billion taka ($88 million) to cover their health insurance costs.

The funds are to be drawn from COVID relief and economic packages that have swollen to $11.26 billion. Hasina on Monday did not give a breakdown, but the increased figure includes $8.5 billion in financial aid, social outreach measures and incentives for industries crippled by the pandemic that the prime minister unveiled in late March and early April.

Part of the packages – 95 billion taka ($1.1 billion) – is to go to aiding agricultural industries such as farming including dairy and poultry, along with fisheries.

“The formation of a fund meant to provide working capital in the agricultural sector has been undertaken,” the prime minister said.

“We had bumper production of rice last year and we have forecast a good yield in the current season, too. Necessary measures have been adopted to maintain the existing supply chain of agricultural products and distribution network.”

Bangladeshi newspapers hit hard

Apart from dealing a severe blow to key export-oriented sectors, particularly the garment industry, where more than 1 million have lost their jobs or been suspended as a result, the pandemic has hit the country’s newspaper industry hard, Bangladeshi press groups say.

At least nine newspapers have stopped printing, and owners of papers in most cases have shuttered newsrooms and offices at short notice and without paying employees their salaries and dues, said Sheikh Mamun-Ur-Rashid, a member of the steering committee of the Press Institute of Bangladesh.

According to the Ministry of Information, 551 daily newspapers are registered in Bangladesh, of which about half are concentrated in the Dhaka area.

“All those nine newspapers are Dhaka-based, and many more outside Dhaka are facing the same situation,” Rashid told BenarNews, referring to the papers that stopped printing, as he called on Hasina to include journalists in her government’s financial outreach to industries that are struggling economically due to the pandemic.

Kamran Reza Chowdhury and Sharif Khiam in Dhaka contributed to this report.