The Indonesian government aims to vaccinate over 200 million citizens in order to achieve herd immunity.

Six months since the beginning of the inoculation drive, less than 10 percent of the country's 272-million population, or 18.7 million people, have been fully vaccinated.

“In order to achieve population immunity, we need to vaccinate around 208 million citizens, including those aged between 12 and 17 years,” the president wrote on his Twitter. His tweet appeared hours after the country reached another sad milestone with daily COVID-19 death toll exceeding the 2,000 mark for the first time since the pandemic started in March last year.

The National Police and the Indonesian Military (TNI) have been involved to accelerate the vaccination drive with an aim of reaching 2 million doses per day, delivering drug to COVID-19 patients quarantined at home and tracing close contact starting next month.

Indonesia has been using mostly vaccine developed by China’s Sinovac Biotech, which also grants a license to state-run pharmaceutical company Bio Farma for packaging vaccine at its factory in Bandung, West Java.

Source: VNA