We also aim to master vaccine production technology on the latest platforms, namely viral-vector and nucleic acid-basedJakarta (ANTARA) - The Health Ministry is pursuing health system transformation through six pillars in order to create a healthy, productive, and fair society, director general of pharmaceuticals and medical devices at the ministry, Roy Himawan, has said.
"The Minister of Health launched the health system transformation to create a more resilient health system in order to create a healthy, productive, and fair society," he remarked at the opening seminar of the “Higher Height-Training of Trainers” program themed "Encouraging the Advancement of Health Biotechnology Education in Indonesia" here on Friday.
The six pillars of health transformation are primary service transformation, referral service transformation, health resilience system transformation, health financing system transformation, health human resources transformation, and health technology transformation.
The transformation of the health system is focused on two sectors: increasing resilience in the health pharmaceutical sector and developing biotechnology, Himawan said.
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In the pharmaceutical sector, in the next four years, Indonesia is targeting to master vaccine production for 14 domestic child immunization programs, he informed.
"We also aim to master vaccine production technology on the latest platforms, namely viral-vector and nucleic acid-based. As President Joko Widodo inaugurated the mRNA platform vaccine production process, which will encourage our resilience in creating the latest biological products," he said.
In the biological sector, the technology will be specifically aimed at producing biological products with local ingredients, he added. The products are insulin, antibody molecules, and plasma products.
"This is one of our targets for the next four years to be able to build domestic production in Indonesia," Himawan said.
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According to him, Indonesia has the potential to achieve maximum health development, supported by the increasing trend of health spending.
However, the health spending is being used for securing health products in the form of drugs and medical devices, most of which are still being imported.
"For our medicines, 90 percent of the raw materials are still imported, and 88 percent of medical device transactions for two years have been for imported products," he pointed out.
Therefore, collaboration between the government, the private sector, and academia is needed to build the most important aspect of biotechnology, namely human resources (HR), to improve health resilience nationally through increased research.
"It can be concluded that we need to increase our research capacity, including research in the field of biotechnology," he added.
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Translator: Fitra Ashari, Resinta S
Editor: Fardah Assegaf
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