JAKARTA (BLOOMBERG) – Indonesia cut short its year-end holiday in a bid to curb the spread of coronavirus infections, after a long weekend in October led to a spike in confirmed cases weeks later.

The government shortened the break by three days, compared with an 11-day long stretch previously. Now, only Dec 24-25 and Dec 31-Jan 1 are set as public holidays.

The year-end holiday had been lengthened earlier to make up for the shortened mid-year Eidal-Fitr holiday.

Indonesia is grappling with South-east Asia’s largest outbreak, with a cumulative total of 543,975 recorded Covid-19 cases as at Tuesday (Dec 1), and 17,081 deaths.

On Tuesday, there were 5,092 new cases and 136 deaths.

An association of doctors had urged the government to shorten or even scrap the holiday entirely as health workers struggled to keep up with the workload.

The shorter holiday could deal a blow to airlines as well as tourist hot spots such as Bali, which had banked on the year-end for a revival in consumer demand.

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