Directorate General of Pharmaceuticals and Medical Devices of the Indonesian Ministry of Health through the Directorate of Pharmaceutical Management and Services held a coordination meeting in the context of monitoring and supervising the quality of logistics management including the preparation of IPV2 switches and the introduction of new vaccines in Pontianak City on November 15-18, 2023.

The purpose of this meeting is to ensure the availability of routine and follow-up immunization vaccines and vaccination support logistics, and improve the quality of vaccine management in Provinces and Districts/Cities.

Vaccine management and vaccination logistics play an important role in ensuring that people have access to health services. Vaccines are temperature-sensitive products. To maintain the quality of vaccines properly, the knowledge and skills of health workers are needed in managing vaccination logistics.

Indonesia has been declared Polio Free (Polio Eradication) by the World Health Organization (WHO) in 2014. Our current challenge is to maintain the polio-free status by implementing all strategies that have become a joint commitment in order to realize a Polio-Free World in 2026.

Polio can be prevented by providing complete polio immunization before the child turns 1 year old. The government has launched national IPV2 immunization as an optimal protection for children in Indonesia against polio.

Based on the national immunization schedule, currently complete polio immunization consists of 4 doses of bivalent Oral Polio Vaccine (bOPV) immunization given as drops and 1 dose of Inactivated Poliovirus Vaccine (IPV) immunization given as injection.

The government will gradually add a second dose of IPV immunization (IPV2) to the routine immunization schedule to maximize protection against polio,

Director General for Pharmaceutical and Medical Devices of the Indonesian Ministry of Health, L. Rizka Andalusia in her remarks expressed her appreciation to the Provincial and Regency/City Health Offices for their active role in managing vaccines and supporting logistics well. Appreciation was also given to development partners, namely GAVI and UNDP-SMILE for their assistance and cooperation in the successful implementation of the vaccination program in Indonesia (15/11).

On this occasion, Director General Rizka also emphasized several things to the Provincial, Regency / City Health Offices, namely "Provincial, Regency / City Health Offices are expected to manage vaccines and vaccination support logistics in an integrated manner at the Pharmacy Installation, immediately synchronize damaged and / or expired COVID-19 vaccine data until the period 31 December 2023, submit a letter of readiness to withdraw damaged and / or expired COVID-19 Vaccines no later than 30 November 2023, and commit to using the SMILE application for recording and reporting vaccination logistics stocks and transactions in real time," said Rizka.

The meeting was attended by representatives from the Directorate of Pharmaceutical Management and Services, Directorate General of Pharmaceuticals and Medical Devices, Directorate of Immunization Management, Bureau of Goods and Services Procurement, Inspectorate General of the Ministry of Health, POM, Ministry of Environment, DTO Team and SMILE Team as well as Provincial/Regency/City Health Offices.