Fajar Pebrianto, Jakarta – The Indonesian government has officially added Sinopharm to the list of authorized COVID-19 booster regimens. Thus, there are now booster shots from six brands, viz. Sinovac, AstraZeneca, Pfizer, Moderna, Janssen (J&J), and Sinopharm.
"The vaccine used for the booster shot is adjusted to the availability of vaccines in each region by prioritizing the vaccines with the closest expiry date," said the spokesperson for the COVID-19 Vaccination at the Health Ministry Siti Nadia Tarmizi in a written statement, Monday, Feb. 28.
The booster vaccination can be carried out in all districts and cities for the general public. However, she said, the primary vaccination course should still be pursued in order to achieve the target.
To date, the vaccination procedure, the place, the flow, and data collection still refer to the old rules namely Circular No. HK.02.02/II/252/2022 concerning COVID-19 vaccine booster.
The booster dose could adopt two methods, homologous or heterologous. A homologous vaccination uses the same vaccine type as the primary vaccine, while a heterologous vaccination uses different vaccine types from the primary vaccine that was previously obtained.
If the primary vaccine type is Sinopharm, then the booster uses Sinopharm at a full dose of 0.5ml.