A reckless and dangerous act
The President’s visit to Tanah Abang was considered reckless and dangerous. The President bore the risk himself, but leaders must not set a bad example for their people.
When advanced countries resolve to avoid and delay the XBB transmission, Indonesia seems to go in a different direction.
Indonesia has taken a reckless and dangerous action. Indonesia’s Public Health Policy was designed hastily —not by epidemiologists— by politicians who have close relationships with corporations. Indonesia’s health policy somehow differs from other countries.
The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) rapidly expands national genomic surveillance to monitor trends in circulating new variants, particularly by conducting a Traveler-base Genomic Surveillance (TGS) to detect and classify new virus variants through nose swab sampling at major US international airports and coronavirus testing.
Indonesia needs a better genomic surveillance
Through genomic surveillance, scientists track the spread of variants and monitor changes to the genetic code of the COVID variants. The sampling would be anonymous.
The TGS has been enacted in seven international airports across the United States, covering 500 flights from at least 30 countries, including 290 weekly flights from China and surrounding countries. There have been 80,000 tourists participating in the TGS from November 2021 to December 2022.
The surveillance quickly expanded into a national and global radar system monitoring the emergence of viruses and bacteria in the United States.