Jakarta (VNA) – The Indonesian government has decided todiscontinue its largest, makeshift COVID-19 hospital occupying the former AsianGames athletes’ village in Jakarta due to a steady decline in new cases.
Themakeshift hospital was set up less than three weeks after the Health Ministryconfirmed the country’s first COVID-19 cases on March 2, 2020. Since it became operational in March 2020, thefacility has treated more than 132,000 COVID-19 patients.
The facility will formally end its function onDecember 31 due to a steady decline in the number of COVID-19 cases acrossIndonesia and a significant decrease in the bed occupation rate ofthe hospital, said head of the National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB) Lieut.Gen Suharyanto.
He added that a similar facility on Galang islandin the province of Riau Islands will also be closed down.
Earlier on December 21, President Joko Widodo indicated that hisgovernment will lift all social restrictions related to COVID-19 that have beenin place for nearly three years, suggesting that the country is nowwell-equipped to deal with the ongoing pandemic.
The countryof 273 million people has recorded 6.7 million cases and over 160,000 deathssince the pandemic began./.
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