A controversial plan by Indonesia's state-owned pharmaceutical company PT Kimia Farma to sell the Covid-19 vaccine has been delayed.

The planned sale, which was due to begin yesterday, met with high demand but triggered angry protests by health activists and parliamentarians who insisted that vaccines should be administered free of charge.

"We will provide more information (later)," said Kimia Farma's corporate secretary Ganti Winarno Putro in response to a query from The Straits Times about the delay.

In a statement later yesterday, the company blamed the huge interest generated by the move for the delay, saying it would allow Kimia Farma to spend more time disseminating information about it and better prepare a registration system for interested individuals.

Indonesia started rolling out its free national vaccination programme in mid-January, with about 5 per cent of its 270 million population inoculated so far, as South-east Asia's most populous country grapples with soaring Covid-19 cases.

The government hopes to achieve herd immunity by the end of the year through a public vaccination programme combined with a private campaign organised by the Indonesian Chamber of Commerce and Industry and bankrolled by participating companies to get their employees inoculated sooner.

The government initially set aside 40,000 doses of the Sinopharm vaccine for use in the private vaccination programme - which costs 879,140 rupiah (S$82) for two doses, inclusive of administering fees - in Java and Bali. The programme was expected to be expanded to other regions later.

A senior government official told ST last month that the private vaccination campaign would not impede the free public one.

The costs saved could be rechannelled to the government's annual aid programme for the underprivileged, to mitigate the economic fallout from the pandemic, the official added.

Ms Diah Saminarsih, senior adviser on gender and youth for the director-general of the World Health Organisation, said the planned private programme would be against the equitable distribution of vaccines.

"It is premature to do it now. Our overall vaccination rate is still far from the target. The paid vaccine shouldn't be an option now, but later," Ms Diah said in a webinar yesterday organised by Jakarta-based Centre for Indonesia's Strategic Development Initiatives, a think-tank that promotes better public health services in the country.

Mr Saleh Daulay, a member of the Parliament's health committee, also took issue with the government for not discussing the private programme with the committee prior to announcing it. He reminded President Joko Widodo of his earlier commitment to provide free vaccines for all.

The government aims to inoculate 181.5 million people, or 67 per cent of the population, by the end of this year. Police and military personnel have been mobilised across the country's 34 provinces to help administer the jabs.

Indonesia has managed to boost its vaccination rate to more than one million doses a day.

The country is in the grip of a fresh Covid-19 wave, with the number of daily cases topping 40,000 for the first time yesterday, bringing its total to 2.57 million and making it the worst hit country in South-east Asia.

There were 891 new deaths reported in the past 24 hours, taking the death toll to 67,355 as at yesterday.