Minister of Health (Menkes) Budi Gunadi Sadikin simply explained the emergence of a new variant of COVID-19 that has caught the world’s attention, including Indonesia.
The new variant of COVID-19, which was originally discovered in the UK, is called the Minister of Health, which is more quickly transmitted.
“Indeed, the virus is a collection of living proteins. To make this a little simple, why is it called the corona virus, the virus is round, there are coronas, there are like horns. In which there is protein n, e or m. “The horn is called protein S. In these proteins there are many amino acids, the components in the protein that make up this protein and that which change,” said Minister of Health Budi Gunadi in a video quoted on Sunday, January 3.
The Minister of Health’s explanation video about the new COVID-19 variant has been uploaded to Sandiaga Uo’s Instagram account.
“What is the impact (new variant) on us? number 1 is more contagious, number 2 is no more deadly. Number 3 can still be detected with the virus with existing tools, antigen swab or PCR swab, “said the Minister of Health.
The COVID-19 mutation is called the Minister of Health cannot be detected. However, if someone is exposed to this virus, it is certain that the Minister of Health can be detected.
“And most likely it could be inhibited by the current vaccine,” he said.
Regarding the discovery of a new variant of COVID-19 in Indonesia, the Minister of Health said that it had not been identified conservatively.
“Why? because Indonesia has not routinely carried out genome sequencing, so people who are sick will have their samples taken for genome sequencing, how many mutations are they, we have not been disciplined (genome sequencing), “said the Minister of Health.
Previously, Zubairi Djoerban, Chair of the COVID-19 Task Force for the Executive Board of the Indonesian Doctors Association (IDI), said that the new variant of COVID-19 that was initially found in England was detected through a polymerase chain reaction (PCR) based swab test. Therefore, IDI asks the public not to worry about diagnosing a new variant of COVID-19.
“Now the virus is changing clothes, but PCR can still detect the head and feet. This means that PCR can still detect this new variant, so there is no need to worry too much for diagnosis,” said Zubairi in a talk show broadcast on BNPB YouTube account, Tuesday, December 29. 2020.
He said, the mutation of the corona virus named B117 was indeed more infectious. In fact, Zubairi said the new virus was 71 percent more infectious than the previous virus. But, he made sure this virus was not deadlier.
“Experts are now very, very confident that (the new virus, red) is very, very contagious but not more deadly. Again, no more deadly,” he said.
