Doffins are being prepared for children in Indonesia
At least 1,245 Indonesian children have died from coronavirus since the pandemic began, although the actual number is thought to be higher, given the low level of testing for the virus in remote areas.The majority of those who died were under the age of five.
According to the Indonesian Paediatric Society (IDAI), more than 100 Indonesian children have died every week since July from COVID-19.
Their data shows more than 70 percent of child deaths related to COVID-19 occurred in the past two months, coinciding with the spread of the Delta variant around Indonesia.
Dr Aman Bhakti Pulungan, the head of the IDAI, says there are a few factors contributing to the high mortality rate from COVID-19 for young children.
Among them, inadequate facilities for treating sick children at hospitals and health clinics.
“Inequality is one of the problems. Inequality in treatment because not every place has a paediatric or neonatal intensive care unit,” Dr Aman said.“People said that children are not affected and that children cannot die. But right now, we have a lot of children dying.”
Experts warn that a slow vaccination drive outside big cities is also putting young people in danger, as many children contract the virus from unvaccinated family members.
“Indonesia is not just Java and Bali … The vaccine coverage of the whole population, including the elderly is not enough yet,” Dr Aman said.
“Most children [contract the virus] from within the family. Especially babies and those under five.”
At a hospital in Indonesia’s Sikka regency, funeral workers have come to collect a small coffin left outside the emergency ward. It is light enough for the two workers to carry with ease. Inside is the body of a two-month-old baby. Her name was Maria.“The symptoms were coughing, runny nose and fever. Now, our child has died,” her mother, Mari Balu, said.
In the days before their daughter’s death, Mari and her husband travelled from their village in Paga, seeking medical care for their sick child.
They travelled by motorbike and ambulance for almost three hours to get to the hospital in Maumere, the capital of Sikka regency, in East Nusa Tenggara, Indonesia’s southernmost province.
Now their traumatic ordeal is over – and it ended as Mari feared it would.
They have returned home to their village to share the sad news with their community.
“We came back here from Maumere because our child is dead,” Mari said.
“When we saw that our daughter had died, it was my husband who organised the funeral.”
The family lives in a remote community. There is no electricity in their village. The nearest source of water is two kilometres (1.2 miles) away.
Mari does not have a photo of her daughter and hopes the memory of their short time together will not fade.
“I stay at home and rest because I am always thinking about my daughter,” she said.
The pain of losing a child to COVID-19 is something many families across Indonesia are now experiencing.
