Science’s COVID-19 reporting is supported by the Pulitzer Center and the Heising-Simons Foundation.
A new face at the helm of Indonesia’s Ministry of Health has raised scientists’ hopes that the country may take a more scientific approach to its increasingly desperate struggle with COVID-19. In a 22 December 2020 cabinet reshuffle, Indonesian President Joko Widodo named Budi Gunadi Sadikin, who has a degree in nuclear physics, as health minister. He took over from Terawan Agus Putranto, a military doctor known for pushing a controversial, unproven stroke therapy he had developed himself. His sluggish, secretive management of the pandemic was widely seen as a failure.