Do not rush it to change the endemic status
Pontianak, W Kalimantan (ANTARA) - The COVID-19 condition in Indonesia was heading to an endemic phase, though the government was not in a hurry to change the status, Indonesian Vice President Ma'ruf Amin stated.

"For now, we have not yet changed the status, although we are heading to an endemic stage when looking at the update of the case count. However, the government still needs to confirm it once again," Amin noted in Pontianak, West Kalimantan, on Thursday.

The vice president remarked that the handling of COVID-19 in Indonesia was quite good as compared to that in other countries. Nevertheless, the conditions would likely change.

"Do not rush it to change the endemic status. We must be careful to avoid another increase in cases. We must stay in a position where there is no turmoil," Amin emphasized.

Meanwhile, President of the United States, Joe Biden, in an interview on the CBS' '60 Minutes' program expressed belief that the COVID-19 pandemic was over despite acknowledging that the country was still facing problems with the SARS-CoV-2 virus that was continuously mutating.

On a separate occasion, Director General of the World Health Organization (WHO) Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus highlighted that the end of the COVID-19 pandemic was near, and the world had never been in a better position to end the disease.

Based on data from the COVID-19 Task Force as of September 21, 2022, the total number of confirmed positive cases in Indonesia increased by 2,384, thereby bringing the total count to 6,415,328 since COVID-19 struck in March 2020.

The count of recovered cases also increased by 2,991 people, bringing the total to 6,231,970 cases, while the number of deaths increased by 18 people to a total of 157,948 since the first COVID-19 case appeared in Indonesia.

As for the vaccinations conducted, the government administered a total of 204,388,537 first-dose COVID-19 vaccines, followed by 170,997,002 doses for the second vaccination, some 62,879,386 doses for the third dose or booster, and 566,853 doses for the second booster.

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Translator: Desca Lidya N, Resinta S
Editor: Sri Haryati
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