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The end of an era, toward a new beginning
Despite a bureaucratic vacuum in commissions designated to combat the H5N1 and H1N1 influenzas, a health officials says the country remains well prepared to fight outbreaks of disease
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espite a bureaucratic vacuum in commissions designated to combat the H5N1 and H1N1 influenzas, a health officials says the country remains well prepared to fight outbreaks of disease.
While the term of the national avian influenza commission comes to a close this March, a new commission to combat H5N1 and H1N1 is yet to be established.
Bayu Krisnamurthi, the chairman of the National Commission for Bird Flu Control and Pandemic Influenza Preparedness (Komnas FBPI), said that agriculture and health ministries would fill the hiatus until the planned national commission of zoonosis was fully established.
“It has all been planned,” Bayu told The Jakarta Post.
He said the new commission would handle a wider scope of diseases transmissible from animals to humans and would have a different member and organizational structures than Komnas FBPI.
Bayu said that more details about the zoonosis commission would be announced on Wednesday.
Komnas FBPI was formed in 2006, after a presidential decree issued by President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono.
More than 40 people died from avian influenza in Indonesia in 2006.
Komnas FBPI, then chaired by current Golkar Party head Aburizal Bakrie, launched an intensive campaign to curb the spread of the virus. According to data from the World Health Organization, the number of deaths due to Avian Influenza A (H5N1) in Indonesia gradually decreased from 45 in 2006, to 37 in 2007 and 19 in 2009.
The data revealed that Indonesia was the country with the largest number of cases and deaths, topping Vietnam, Egypt and China.
The number of cases dropped from 55 in 2006 to 20 in 2009.
Wiwiek Bagja, from the Indonesian Veterinary Medical Association, who is also a member of Komnas FBPI, said the role of the commission was to coordinate the ministries, mainly the Health Ministry and Agriculture Ministry, in dealing with the threats.
The crucial role the commission has played, along with the increasing rate and variation of zoonotic diseases, have made the establishment of a new commission more pressing, Wiwiek said.
“Climate change has caused various mutations of viruses and insect vectors-such as mosquitoes,” she said.
According to her, the changes posed of a threat of zoonotic diseases worldwide.
