Gov’t Rolls Out Gotong Royong Vaccination Program for Private Sector, SOEs

By Office of Assistant to Deputy Cabinet Secretary for State Documents & Translation     Date 27 Februari 2021
Category: News
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Source: PR of Ministry of Health

In a bid to accelerate and expand the coverage of COVID-19 vaccination in order to achieve immunity faster, the Government has launched the implementation of COVID-19 vaccination in mutual cooperation (program vaksinasi gotong royong)

The vaccination program is regulated in Regulation of Minister of Health Number 10 of 2021 on the implementation of vaccinations in the context of COVID-19 pandemic mitigation stipulated on Wednesday (24/2).

According to Spokesperson for COVID-19 vaccination Siti Nadia Tarmizi, the scheme of the vaccination will be administered by state-owned enterprises.

“The Gotong Royong vaccination program will not disrupt the Government’s free vaccination drive,” she said as quoted from the kemenkes.go.id page, Saturday (26/2).

Nadia went on to say that the vaccination service in this scheme would be carried out by private and state-owned health care facilities who meet the requirements as a vaccination service provider.

“In implementing this Gotong Royong vaccination program, the organizers must coordinate with regencies / cities health office,” Nadia said, adding that the Gotong Royong vaccination program technically refers to service standards and standard operating procedures in accordance with the technical guidelines for vaccination.

For the record, the Gotong Royong vaccine will be provided free of charge and every company that will implement the vaccination through this scheme must be responsible for the funding and report the number of participants.

In the Gotong Royong vaccination, six types of vaccines that cannot be used include Sinovac, AstraZeneca, Novavax and Pfizer vaccines since those are the Government’s free vaccination program.

“(State-owned pharmaceutical holding company) PT Bio Farma has begun to explore and discuss the Sinopharm and Moderna vaccine companies regarding vaccine supply according to the principle that must be different from the Government’s free vaccines,” PT Bio Farma spokesperson Bambang Heriyanto said.

The Gotong Royong vaccines, Bambang added, must also obtain an emergency use of authorization (EUA) or the issuance of distribution permits (NIE) from the Food and Drug Supervisory Agency (BPOM) in accordance with statutory provisions.

The Gotong Royong vaccines will be procured by Ministry of SOEs and PT Bio Farma. In addition, PT Bio Farma will be also responsible for the Gotong Royong vaccine distribution to private and state-owned health facilities, which are involved in collaboration with legal/business entities.

To speed up vaccine distribution, Bambang added, the distribution will be tailored to the needs of legal / business entities and PT Bio Farma will collaborate with the private sector to ensure that the entire distribution process runs smoothly and will not disrupt the Government’s vaccine program.

The handling of post-immunization follow-up incidents (KIPI) in the Gotong Royong vaccination will be implemented in the same time as the Government’s vaccination program.

According to Coordinator of Project Management Office for Public Communication Committee for COVID-19 Handling and National Economic Recovery Arya Sinulingga, who also serves as Spokesperson of Ministry of SOEs, the Gotong Royong vaccination is part of the Government’s measures to accommodate companies to help overcome the COVID-19 pandemic through regulations stipulated by the Government.

“In fact, this is a parallel effort that complements and strengthens each other. The Government’s vaccination program is still running so it will not change the schedule or targets that have been set,” he remarked.

As an institution in charge of the Gotong Royong vaccination program, Ministry of SOEs also ensures that the vaccination will run smoothly. (PR of Ministry of Health/UN) (RIF/EP)

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