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Jokowi urges calm following detection of country's first monkeypox case
The President has asked the public to remain calm in a reassuring statement, pointing out that monkeypox is a very different disease from COVID-19, and that the government is ordering vaccines and tightening screening measures.
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A monkeypox virion, obtained from a clinical sample associated with the 2003 outbreak in prairie dogs in the Midwestern United States, is seen in this undated electron microscopy image provided by the US’ Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). On the left are mature, oval-shaped virus particles, and on the right are crescent-shaped and spherical particles of immature virions. (AFP/Cynthia Goldsmith)
P
resident Joko “Jokowi” Widodo has called on the people “not to panic” following confirmation on Saturday of the country’s first case of monkeypox in a 27-year-old man who had returned from overseas.
The President played down the severity of the disease and made assurances that the necessary treatments were coming.
“We don’t need to panic because the monkeypox virus spreads mainly through direct contact and not through [respiratory] droplets,” the President told reporters on Tuesday, on the sidelines of his visit to Taman Mini Indonesia Indah cultural park in East Jakarta.
“I’ve asked the health minister to procure the vaccine as soon as possible and to tighten screening measures at border checkpoints and crowded spaces,” he added.
Health Minister Budi Gunadi Sadikin had made a similarly reassuring statement on Monday, saying that the ministry was currently working to procure around 10,000 vaccine doses to be administered only to confirmed cases and their close contacts. It was also looking to expand the country’s testing capacity from two to 12 laboratories.
He also stressed that monkeypox was unlikely to pose as big a threat to public health as COVID-19 had.
“From early May until now, some 35,000 confirmed monkeypox cases have been recorded globally. During the same period, we discovered millions of COVID-19 cases across the world. Why is this? Because monkeypox does not spread as easily as COVID-19,” Budi said.
