Malaria remains a persistent threat to Indonesian communities as an endemic disease. The infectious illness, transmitted through the bites of female Anopheles mosquitoes, witnessed a significant decline in Indonesia from 2010 to 2014, followed by stagnation in 2015 and a resurgence from 2019 to 2022.
During her inaugural speech as a professor at the UGM Senate Hall on Thursday (Jan. 25), professor of parasitology at the UGM Faculty of Medicine, Public Health, and Nursing, Professor E. Elsa Herdiana Murhandarwati, shed light on the numerous challenges hindering malaria elimination efforts in Indonesia.
She underscored three primary factors contributing to the unbalanced malaria situation: the agent (cause), host (carrier), and environment.
“The emergence of new contributors in each of these factors presents escalating challenges to malaria control,” she elaborated.
In her speech titled “Malaria Control in Indonesia: Laboratory-Based Research Towards Implementation in the Field,” Professor Murhandarwati outlined the National Action Plan for Accelerating Malaria Elimination 2020-2026 to achieve malaria elimination by 2030.
This plan includes five main interventions: ensuring universal access to malaria prevention, diagnosis, and treatment; accelerating the achievement and maintenance of malaria-free status; transforming malaria surveillance into a primary intervention; creating an environment conducive to malaria elimination; and improving services through innovation and research.
“As an academic and researcher in parasitology, we endeavor to contribute through innovation and research that can be implemented in line with national intervention strategies,” she emphasized.
Taking lessons from the COVID-19 pandemic, the government benefitted significantly from the participation of digital health providers in counseling and teleconsultation for COVID-19 patients or suspects.
These health startups or providers are expected to support not only COVID-related issues but also address other health problems, including malaria. However, existing regulations do not encompass digital health providers from a legal perspective outside of pandemic periods.
“Thus, our team, with support from RISPRO LPDP, aims to establish regulatory sandbox governance alongside the Ministry of Health’s Malaria Working Group, the Association of Healthtech Indonesia, and experts from various disciplines such as law, electrical engineering, CFDS, and practitioners,” she elucidated.
The regulatory sandbox offers a controlled experimental space for various stakeholders, allowing the testing of new technologies developed by providers/startups in areas such as malaria diagnosis, treatment quality assurance, surveillance, e-learning, and more.
Additionally, this mechanism enables the government to trial new policies related to malaria elimination without encountering stringent regulatory constraints, facilitating the identification of potential impacts and adjustments before widespread implementation.
“At present, clinical practitioners in digital health have made valuable contributions. However, there is a pressing need for a space to nurture and implement ideas in accordance with scientific, ethical, safe, and secure standards,” she emphasized.
Professor Murhandarwati disclosed that in 2023, the e-Malaria Regulatory Sandbox trial was adopted and expanded by the Ministry of Health through Minister of Health Decree No. HK.01.07/MENKES/1280/2023 concerning the Development of the Health Digital Ecosystem through the Regulatory Sandbox.
Consequently, the Ministry of Health has initiated the Regulatory Sandbox system to pilot various domestic digital health innovations, commencing with the telemedicine sector.
“Hopefully, in the future, this regulatory sandbox will emerge as an innovative solution benefiting all,” she concluded.
Author: Ika
Photographer: Firsto