JAKARTA | INDONESIA - The government stated that the number of patients who tested positive for the corona virus and contracted Covid-19 in Indonesia was increasing. Based on data received until Friday (27/3/2020) at 12.00 WIB, there were a total of 1.046 cases of Covid-19. Based on data collected within 24 hours since Thursday (26/3/2020) at 12.00 WIB, 153 new cases were added.
"There are 153 new cases. This shows that there is transmission of this disease in our society, "said a government spokesman for the handling of the corona virus Achmad Yurianto in a press conference at Graha BNPB, Friday afternoon.
"So that the total cases became 1.046," said Yurianto.
Yurianto also explained that a total of 46 Covid-19 patients had been declared cured. This number increased by 11 patients recovered yesterday.
Then, Yurianto also mentioned that there were 9 additional Covid-19 patients who had died. Thus, a total of 87 patients died after testing positive for the corona virus.
Based on the data shown by the government, it appears that there is an addition of 1 province that recorded the first case of Covid-19. The province is West Papua which recorded 2 prime cases. Thus, until now the Covid-19 case has spread in 28 provinces.
British Researcher: Hundreds of Thousands of Corona Cases in Indonesia were Undetected
British researchers stated that the number of undetected Covid-19 cases in Indonesia could actually reach tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of cases. However, cases of the SARS-COV-2 corona virus were not detected due to low levels of testing by the government.
This was revealed by researchers of the Infectious Diseases Mathematical Modeling Center (CMMID) London, England. Those who developed mathematical modeling to roughly predict the number of cases of Covid-19 in a country based on the number of deaths.
Based on data, the death rate due to Covid-19 in Indonesia is the highest in the world with a percentage reaching 8,7 percent or 78 deaths from 893 cases as of Thursday (26/3/2020).
The prediction of CMMID modeling depends on two key variables, namely the mortality rate and the rate of transmission, and it measures how many people a single person is likely to be infected with.
They then compared the death rate in Indonesia with WHO's Covid-19 mortality data of 3 percent (3 deaths per 100 cases). The rate of transmission of Covid-19 is also estimated to be at numbers 2 and 3, which means that each patient is positive, transmitting to two or three other people.
The combination of these two data, combined with the death rate in Indonesia, means that experts estimate that the actual rate of Covid-19 infection in Indonesia is already higher.
Conservative estimates, according to CMMID modeling with a Covid-19 death rate of 1 percent and a transmission rate to 2 people predict that there have been 70.848 cases of the new corona virus in Indonesia.
Meanwhile, if the infection rate is increased to number 3, then there may be 251.424 cases in Indonesia. Where one Covid-19 death will show there are 5.238 cases in the community. The true value is likely somewhere in between.
CMMID associate professor Stefan Flasche said that the number of cases of the new coronavirus would double every seven days. “One would expect that the roughly six reported deaths per day that you see today [in Indonesia] will increase to 12 deaths per day next week and 24 deaths per day thereafter. [It will stop] unless there are major efforts aimed at stopping the spread through for example, social distancing, "he said, as quoted by the ABC.
When asked about the possibility of 1 million cases in Indonesia by the end of April, he thought it might happen. This possibility reflects the high population in Indonesia with 270 million inhabitants.
"Maybe make semi-plausible, as the worst case scenario," he said.
Professor Niall Ferguson of Imperial College in London, England, also supports this calculation. According to him, one death shows at least a thousand cases in the community with an assumption of 1 percent mortality rate.
"We think the epidemic without measurement ... will probably double every five days ... and only one in 100 infected people will die," he said.
"If the sufferer is showing symptoms, it will take 20 days or more for them to die. So today's death toll shows the epidemic that occurred 20 days ago. "
"The epidemic at that time (20 days ago) must have been 10 times smaller. If you multiply it by the number 100 deaths, you get a multiplier for 1.000 cases. "
Previously, the Minister of Health predicted that there might be 700 thousand cases in Indonesia. However, it did not explain when Indonesia would reach this figure. [DDHKNews / source: Kompas / CNN Indonesia]
