Indonesia to be vaccine self-sufficient by 2037, says health minister

Telegraph

3 days ago

The UK has just announced a 40 per cent real terms cut to its funding for Gavi, the global vaccine alliance, but Indonesia and many other developing countries are investing – and in many respects that is how it is supposed to be.
In an exclusive interview with the Telegraph, Budi Gunadi Sadikin, Indonesia's health minister, said he aimed to make the country 'self-sufficient' in vaccine production by 2037.
The lesson of the Covid pandemic was that no large country, including Britain, could rely on others in a global health emergency, he said.
'Every country with a very large population, they need to have their own vaccine [production] for health security, for healthcare system resiliency,' he said.
Recalling that Indonesia and Britain had relied on India for Covid vaccines, only to see exports blocked when demand in India spiked, he added: 'We cannot put the lives of 280 million Indonesians at risk by depending on other countries when the next pandemic happens.'
Mr Sadikin, a former banker with a sense of realpolitik that is rare in global health, stressed that he was not dismissing cooperation with other countries or blaming India, but emphasising the importance of national autonomy and self-reliance.
'Everybody wants to protect their own people, which is understandable,' he said. 'If you are a politician in India, two billion people will force you to do that. It is democratically understood.'
Indonesia is Southeast Asia's largest economy and the world's third most populous country after India and China. It is currently classed as an 'upper middle income' country and is predicted to be the world's fourth largest economy by 2045.
Already it is ranked seventh in terms of GDP purchasing power parity – three rungs ahead of the UK – and a recent survey found that more people report themselves to be 'thriving' in Indonesia than any other country in the world.
Last week Mr Sadikin hosted a summit in Bali where healthcare leaders plotted a path to the global elimination of cervical cancer – the first cancer likely to succumb to a vaccine.
The aim of the global WHO's Cervical Cancer Elimination Initiative is to wipe out the disease through a strategy focused on vaccination, screening, and treatment.
Mr Sadikin said that cervical cancer remains the second most lethal cancer among women in Indonesia after breast cancer, killing some 60,000 women a year, or 'one death every 35 minutes'.
The country's National Cervical Cancer Elimination Plan, launched in 2023, has already achieved over 90 per cent HPV vaccination rates for girls through a schools based programme. The country is also now making the jab available for women aged 21-26 who have missed out.
Mr Sadikin said increased availability of the vaccine – which has until recently been limited by supply and dosing constraints – would also be extended to boys in Indonesia to protect against HPV related head, throat and neck cancers from 2026.
He added that there was little or no residence to HPV vaccination in Indonesia, a majority Muslim country.
'Indonesian women are very receptive, very receptive, compared with other vaccinations,' he said.
'My observation, my first hypothesis, is they know it can save their life. Second, the vaccines were available before but it was very expensive'. It created a feeling of 'FOMO', or fear of missing out, he added.
Indonesia is also gearing up to become something of a regional vaccine superpower and now has three domestic manufacturers.
The biggest firm, Biofarma, produces vaccines against measles, polio and hepatitis B and will soon become a major supplier of HPV vaccine via a technology transfer deal with MSD, the international arm of Merck.
Biofarma also makes antivenoms for snakebite. Snakes such as pit vipers and cobras are common across many of the 17,500 islands in the Indonesian archipelago.
'MSD is deeply committed to the global elimination of cervical cancer and prevention of certain other HPV related cancers, including in low- and middle-income countries where the burden is highest,' said Dr Priya Agrawal of MSD.
'The technology transfer with MSD for HPV vaccines has allowed us to make our own vaccines for our own country,' added Shadiq Akasya, CEO of Biofarma. 'This will save many lives, accelerate elimination of cervical cancer, and support the aims of national health security.'
Bolstering a 'heavenly investment'
Mr Sadikin put Indonesia's position at the top of the 'thriving' league down to the relaxed character and pace of life for which places like Bali are famous for.
'We still work pretty hard but we are not as ambitious and determined and greedy for money as some,' he said. 'We are very laid back, we are happy with what we have.'
Mr Sadikin, who is religious, has a relaxed style but is no slouch. He made a fortune in banking and now says he is dedicating himself to health.
'I have more than enough earthly investment but I don't have enough heavenly investment,' he said. 'If I save 60,000 women from cervical cancer, God will definitely remember that. It's my dividend, my deposit, for the afterlife'.
Yet the skills Mr Sadikin learned as a banker are now in huge demand in the area of global health as international aid budgets are cut.
They are skills that are making him popular across the sector – perhaps popular enough to tempt him to run as the next WHO director general when Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus steps down in two years time.
'Historically, you can easily check that our enemy, the one that kills most human beings, is the pathogen,' he said. And the trick to raising money for health was to 'make the right investment case'.
'My advice to all the health ministers, my colleagues, is that there is a huge amount of money floating around in the world. You just need to know where to knock on the door.'
He added: 'If global health needs more finance people like me – people that can help get political leaders not to use your money to buy things to kill people but buy goods to save people – then 'yes', I think I can be pretty good at selling that concept across'.