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Jakarta aims for 75.2% coverage in 'massive' COVID-19 vaccination drive amid 2-week spike
Jakarta's COVID-19 vaccination program comes not a moment too soon amid a two-week surge in daily cases, with coverage targeting 75.2 percent of the city's population in hopes of achieving herd immunity.
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Two health workers take part in a vaccination training simulation on Jan. 13, 2021 at Tambak Maternity Hospital in Jakarta, with one giving and the other receiving the "vaccine". (Antara/Aprillio Akbar)
J
akarta, the epicenter of the country’s COVID-19 epidemic, kicked off its vaccination drive on Thursday following record daily highs over the past two weeks.
Jakarta Health Agency head Widyastuti said at a press briefing on Jan. 14 that the city aimed to vaccinate 7.9 million people to achieve herd immunity. "It's our largest vaccination drive. Our previous mass vaccination program was only designed [to inoculate] 2 million people," said Widyastudi, without indicating the year or the targeted disease of the previous program.
Based on the official population of 10.5 million, this works out to 75.2 percent of Jakartans getting the jab.
An article published on Johns Hopkins’ COVID-19: School of Public Health Expert Insights states: “Depending how contagious an infection is, usually 50% to 90% of a population needs immunity to achieve herd immunity”. Meanwhile, the World Health Organization (WHO) has maintained that “The proportion of the population that must be vaccinated against COVID-19 to begin inducing herd immunity is not known.”
Read also: 'Long road' to herd immunity even with COVID-19 vaccination
The first stage of Jakarta’s COVID-19 vaccination program commenced on Thursday, with health authorities aiming to inoculate 60,000 health workers and a handful of public officials.
“We received 120,040 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine from state-owned pharmaceutical firm PT Bio Farma on Jan. 11,” said Widyastuti.
