TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - The Ministry of Research, Technology, and Higher Education’s Covid-19 Research and Innovation Consortium Head, Ali Ghufron Mukti, said that there have yet been any drugs that can be claimed to be a cure for the virus that first emerged in the province of Wuhan, China.

“To date, there are none of us that can claim a cure, even though many claims emerge from what they argue as [product of research], but none can be classified specifically for the use of curing COVID-19, even from consortium members,” said Ali in a discussion with the National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB) on Tuesday, August 18.

This comes after news about a COVID-19 cure, claimed to be 98 percent effective, that has passed the phase 3 clinical trial done by a joint team of researchers from the Airlangga University, national intelligence agency (BIN), the Indonesian Army, and BPOM, which also claims the number of WHO-referred drugs is potent when combined as a single cure.

Ali Ghufron’s statement was approved by the Indonesian Food and Drug Monitoring Agency (BPOM) drug supervising committee member, Anwar Santoso, who also attended the discussion.

“I agree with what Gufron said, there have yet been any statements that suggest there is a safe and effective cure for COVID-19. Each and every one of them is undergoing clinical trial phases,” said Anwar.

Both speakers also cited the World Health Organization’s official statement saying that every possible cure is still undergoing clinical trials.

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ANDITA RAHMA