Young people first: Indonesia’s COVID vaccine strategy questioned
Al JazeeraIndonesia starts mass vaccination on Wednesday, but experts say inoculating young people first will not help reduce fatalities because it is the elderly who are most at risk. “So the argument that older people should not be vaccinated because they have not been included in trials in Indonesia is not valid.” Indonesia’s strategy is the reverse of the accepted wisdom on vaccination, with medical experts saying the first groups to be vaccinated should be front-line medical staff and then the elderly. “I would choose AstraZeneca’s first because it can also be stored in a refrigerator like Sinovac’s and they have a great track record, whereas Chinese vaccine makers do not,” he said. “But Sinovac’s vaccine doesn’t have any vac-flexibility so it would be the last one I would choose.” He added, “We have a proverb in Indonesia ‘Tidak ada rotan, akar pun jadi’. They already have millions of Sinovac vaccines, so they’re going to use them.” It’s the economy Working-age adults will also be prioritised in the second phase of Indonesia’s vaccination drive – a grand plan to inoculate 181.5 million people, or approximately 67 percent of the country’s 273 million people, within 15 months.