TheJakartaPost

Please Update your browser

Your browser is out of date, and may not be compatible with our website. A list of the most popular web browsers can be found below.
Just click on the icons to get to the download page.

Jakarta Post

Homegrown vaccine greenlit to combat resurgent COVID-19

President calls for year-end vaccination drive.

Fikri Harish (The Jakarta Post)
Jakarta
Tue, November 8, 2022

Share This Article

Change Size

Homegrown vaccine greenlit to combat resurgent COVID-19

A

uthorities are gearing up for another round of COVID-19 vaccinations at the end of the year, with the Food and Drug Monitoring Agency (BPOM) giving the go-ahead for the homegrown Inavac vaccine to be used for the public amid diminishing immunity and slowing booster coverage.

The BPOM on Friday granted emergency use authorization (EUA) for the first-ever vaccine jab to be fully developed by local stakeholders. Previously known as the Merah Putih vaccine, it was jointly developed by local drug firm PT Biotis Pharmaceuticals Indonesia and Airlangga University in Surabaya, East Java, using an inactivated virus platform, similar to the one co-produced by China’s Sinovac Biotech.

The announcement came at a crucial time, with Indonesia seeing a rise in COVID-19 cases driven by the new XBB strain of the Omicron variant. Recently the nation has seen some 5,000 daily new infections, more than double the 2,000 average reported in September and October.

Biotis CEO FX Sudirman, who was on hand at the EUA reveal, explained that the production of the vaccine was already under way. The company is expecting 5 million doses to be administered by the end of this year.

“The Health Ministry expects the vaccines to be ready to use by the end of November as currently, vaccine stock is limited,” Sudirman said at the press conference.

Talk of another round of state-led vaccinations had surfaced since mid-October, six months since the last booster shot rollout.

In an interview with The Jakarta Post in the lead-up to the Group of 20 Summit, President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo said the government remained vigilant even as the public’s immunity against COVID-19 had started to wane.

“As a result, the government is planning another vaccination drive by the end of this year,” Jokowi said in an exclusive interview on Oct. 31 for the Post’s G20 Digest.

Homegrown vaccine

Health Ministry spokeswoman Siti Nadia Tarmizi confirmed that the ministry planned on using the Inavac vaccine as soon as possible. “Yes, it’s already on the books. We plan on using locally produced vaccines as both primary vaccines and as boosters,” Siti told the Post on Monday.

While she could not yet comment on the President’s plan for another vaccination campaign, Siti noted that the government was still encouraging members of the public to get their booster shots if they had not done so already.

On Friday, another ministry spokesperson said that while the recent increase in infections was not too much a cause for concern, people were still encouraged to get their booster shots due to flagging coverage, which stands at a meager 27.62 percent of the targeted population.

And while the BPOM has greenlit the jabs for Inavac, Siti said the ministry awaited advice from the Indonesian Technical Advisory Group on Immunization (ITAGI).

“We’ll start administering the [Inavac] vaccine once it’s been mass produced and once the ITAGI has published its recommendations,” said Siti.

No one from the ITAGI was immediately available for comment.

Inavac’s use approval follows in the footsteps of another homegrown vaccine, PT Bio Farma’s Indovac, which was rolled out in mid-October. The two initiatives are part of President Jokowi’s larger push for Indonesia to achieve vaccine self-sufficiency.

“The State-Owned Enterprises Ministry and the Health Ministry must push Bio Farma even further so we can achieve vaccine self-sufficiency and add more revenue streams for Indonesia,” Jokowi said during the Indovac rollout event on Oct. 13.

Developed together with the Baylor College of Medicine in the United States, the Indovac vaccine is touted as an example of global cooperation on health.

“Indovac is just the beginning, in the future, we will push for even more global cooperation,” said State-Owned Enterprises Minister Erick Thohir at the time.

Global pandemic fund

Coming up with a more robust global health architecture is one of the main priorities of Indonesia’s G20 presidency this year. At the conclusion of the G20 Health Ministers’ Meeting last month, G20 countries continued to work on establishing a global Pandemic Fund, which will help finance medical access for lower-to-middle income countries in preparation for future pandemics.

“Despite our differences, the G20 member states have come together to speak the same language – the language of humanity above all, the language of health that knows no borders,” said Health Minister Budi Gunadi Sadikin on Oct. 28.

The details of the Pandemic Fund are expected to be ironed out this weekend as the health and finance ministers of G20 member states are set to convene in Bali on Friday and Saturday.

{

Your Opinion Matters

Share your experiences, suggestions, and any issues you've encountered on The Jakarta Post. We're here to listen.

Enter at least 30 characters
0 / 30

Thank You

Thank you for sharing your thoughts. We appreciate your feedback.