As Indonesia is struggling to contain the spread of COVID-19, nearly 1300 people at a military academy were tested positive for COVID-19.
Initially 30 people were hospitalized with mild symptoms. Then the Indonesian Army Officer Candidate School was asked to strictly adhere to quarantine protocols.
Of the 1,280 confirmed infections, 991 were cadets and the rest were staff and their family members. Most were asymptomatic cases.
The outbreak was first detected when two cadets went to a medical facility after complaining of fever and back pain.
They were tested for COVID-19 and the results were positive. This sparked a mass swab testing at the academy. The academy has about 2000 staff and cadets.
The governor of West Java apologised for the outbreak.
He asked the residents to co-operate and follow social distancing and other prevention measures.
He urged them to specifically restrict movement around the academy until the situation comes back to normalcy.
Indonesia is the hardest-hit country in South-east Asia, with more than 74,000 active cases of Covid-19 and over 3,500 deaths.
The real toll is widely believed to be much higher, owing to the low-scale testing methodology of Indonesia.
The World Health Organisation recently urged Indonesia to do more testing.
Source: AFP