Universitas Indonesia (UI) student, Dini Kurniawati, together with a team from Thinkwell, LLC/USAID Health Financing Activity recommended a policy related to “Potensi Penghematan Biaya Skrining Calon Pengantin (catin) terhadap Penurunan Penyakit” (Potential Cost Savings for Prospective Bride and Groom Screening to Reduce Disease). This screening effort is useful for preventing the transmission of disease to the bride and groom and the fetus.
“In Indonesia, catin screening has only been implemented in DKI Jakarta since 2017. Therefore, if the Ministry of Health later wants to implement catin screening throughout Indonesia, a calculation formula is needed for the government budget needs and how the potential savings are if this policy is implemented,” said Dini.
The calculation formula used by Dini and her team is through the projection of the number of brides and grooms in the next five years, with the unit cost of each examination component and the inflation rate. The proposed screening benefit package consists of three scenarios. First, Paket Minimal (Minimum Package), including physical and mental examinations, admission costs, and hemoglobin. Paket Moderat (Moderate Package) includes the Minimum Package plus HIV, syphilis, hepatitis B, tuberculosis, diabetes mellitus, and hypertension examinations. Meanwhile, Paket Komprehensif (Comprehensive Package) includes the Moderate Package plus cenarioia examinations. The formulation is carried out with or without taking into account the JKN membership of the prospective bride and groom.
According to Dini, discussion about financing is important, but has not been done much. For that, they calculated the target of prospective brides and grooms multiplied by the unit cost of the examination. In 2025 in a year, in assumption 1, the need figure was obtained at around 44-256 billion and in assumption 2 around 26-238 billion. After the calculation, a comparison was made with the budget burden in one year from several diseases that had been previously identified. The results turned out to be much lower than the previous budget burden.
“This can be implemented according to the assumptions or scenarios chosen by the Ministry of Health. In the long term, we hope that this can result in savings in social security funds and the government will continue to monitor its use from the implementation of screening, and see its impact on the decline in all diseases to how the cost savings are,” said Dini.
Based on the policy recommendation, Dini, who is a Master’s student in the Public Health Study Program at the Faculty of Public Health UI, won the “Rekomendasi Kebijakan Kesehatan (SiBijaKs) Award 2024” (Health Policy Recommendation (SiBijaKs) Award 2024) competition. SiBijaKs Awards 2024 is a health policy recommendation writing competition held by the Health Development Policy Agency (BKPK) of the Indonesian Ministry of Health, with data from the 2023 Indonesian Health Survey (SKI) as the main data source. The form of recommendations provided is in the form of a policy brief that focuses on certain policy issues and offers alternative solutions.
She and her team also made a presentation in front of echelon 1 at the Ministry of Health to follow up on policy recommendations with the Directorate General of Public Health and the Directorate of Productive Age and Elderly who are responsible for implementing screening. Dini hopes that what has been proposed will be useful for the Ministry of Health in making policies based on existing evidence.
With this policy, Dini hopes that there will be a decrease in the prevalence of infectious and non-infectious diseases, as well as the prevalence of hereditary diseases. In addition, this policy is also expected to support successful pregnancies and contribute to a healthy generation, as well as a decrease in maternal and infant mortality rates.
For the achievements gained by Dini and her team, the Dean of FKM UI, Prof. dr. Mondastri Korib Sudaryo, MS. DSc., gave his appreciation, “As public health academics, one of our duties is to contribute meaningful thoughts and ideas to improve and resolve health problems in our beloved country. Since its establishment in 1965, FKM UI has provided its “head and back” to shoulder and actively participate in health development in Indonesia.”
As a Master of Public Health Sciences student, part of the big family of FKM UI, Dini Kurniawati, together with the team from Thinkwell, LLC/USAID has played a real role through studies, formulations, and recommendations for relevant, concrete, and impactful health policies that have won very proud awards. “We hope that relevant, concrete, and impactful health policy recommendations will continue to be born continuously by the academic community and alumni of FKM UI in particular and of course UI as a whole, for a healthy and prosperous Indonesia,” said Prof. Mondastri.
