Infections at the workplace drive resurgence of Covid 19 cases in Jakarta

JAKARTA - The head of Jakarta's health agency said the capital is in the midst of a surge of workplace infections as officials struggle to enjoin a weary public to remain vigilant against Covid 19.

For more than a month, Indonesia's capital, home to an estimated 10 million people, had been mostly successful in cracking down and slowing the spread of infections after a lockdown began lifting in early June.

But non-essential businesses, including in some of the most prestigious office towers and luxury stores, have become hot spots just as they reopened.

Since mid-July some 45 clusters - two or more simultaneous infections - have emerged as residents take trains and buses to work and mingle with co-workers, often without using masks, Ms Widyastuti, head of Jakarta's health agency told The Straits Times on Friday (July 24).

Hospital beds, too, are filling up again as the number of patients mounts. And this is despite the fact that the percentage of the capital's hospital beds allocated to Covid-19 patients has doubled to 40 per cent.

The reversal of fortune in Jakarta underscores the difficulties in controlling a disease in a city that is home to millions of migrant workers who arrive from the harder-hit places elsewhere in the country.

"This is a heterogeneous city," Ms Widyastuti said.

"We're not like Yogyakarta, where the Sultan can issue an order and everyone obeys," she said referring to the Central Javanese city's widely revered monarch.

Concern is clearly growing in Jakarta about rising infections.

On Saturday, state-owned export financing agency Indonesia Eximbank said it would shut its offices in the Sudirman Central Business District for two weeks .

Christian Dior said it had shut its boutique in the nearby Plaza Senayan shopping mall on Saturday owing to an infection in one of its staff. The shop was due to open again on Tuesday (July 28), according to a statement from the luxury brand.

Days earlier July Bank Central Asia said it shuttered one of its business units located in the 44-story Equity Tower just a stone's throw away.

Officials began lifting restrictions on non-essential businesses in early June as the number of active cases dropped. .

On June 6, the number of those self-isolating and in intensive care totalled 4,411, official data showed. About a month later, by July 6, that number fell to 3,835. But, as of July 27, that tally had surged to 6,695.

To be sure, a second lockdown is not imminent. Hospitals retain capacity and the percentage of positive test results is steady at 5.2 per cent - less than half the national average but well above places like South Korea, where it is less than 1 per cent.

The rate of infection - or Rt - is 1.1, indicating one carrier of the virus infects on average slightly more than one other person.

Contact tracing remains limited at roughly five other people for every new infection - something the city hopes to at least double in the coming weeks as testing laboratories work through bottlenecks.

"We are closely monitoring the data," Ms Widyastuti said.

"Any decision to renew the lockdown will be made based on a number of parameters."

But, after months of imperfect compliance of social distancing, fatigue is setting in.

"People are not using masks," said Dr Erlang Samaoedro, a pulmonary specialist at Persahabatan hospital, one of the capital's main hospitals for Covid 19.

Nearly all of the East Jakarta hospital's 202 beds are filled with Covid 19 patients, compared with 120 at the beginning of the month, Dr Erlang said.

Still, Dr Pandu Riono, an infectious diseases expert at the University of Indonesia who helps advise the government on managing the Covid 19 pandemic, believes the surge in Jakarta is manageable, albeit complicated.

"In Australia - in Melbourne - you can close the city and people cannot enter," Dr Pandu said, referring to that city's recent spike in infections, which topped 530 on Monday.

"There's no possibility to do that here."