Papua New Guinea's acting Secretary of Health says the daily increase of Covid-19 cases in West Papua poses a great threat to his country.
The Papua Region of Indonesia has seen at least 65 new cases of the coronavirus over the past 36 hours bringing a total to some 686 confirmed cases.
Paison Dakulala, who is also the State of Emergency Deputy Controller, said the alarming increase meant that PNG was still in the danger zone as far as the virus and its people must not be complacent.
"With the increase in the number of COVID-19 cases in West Papua, the PNG Government is revisiting its strategies along the Western border with Indonesia," Dr Dakulala said.
"To ensure that the movement of people across the border is tightened to simply avoid possible transmission of COVID-19 in PNG."
"To date, there are no deaths in the country and therefore our Health team and the security forces are on the ground ensuring that this COVID-19 transmission must not take place," he said.
The border between Indonesia and Papua New Guinea is in a heavily forested region where illegal logging operations have persisted for years. Photo: RNZ / Johnny Blades
At this stage, PNG had only eight confirmed cases of Covid-19, the last case was reported about a month ago. All eight have recovered.
As of this week over 31,000 inbound passengers has been screened at the international airport and seaport in Port Moresby.
More than 8,500 travellers has been being monitored by health surveillance teams.
Repatriation plans ongoing
Meanwhile the PNG Government said it was working hard to bring back citizens and residents stranded abroad because of the global Covid-19 crisis.
The government said this included 127 Papua New Guineans in Fiji and it was in the process of arranging an aircraft to bring them home.
Once organised, the aircraft would also make a stop in Solomon Islands to deliver 600 kilogrammes of protective equipment and it would bring 10 tonnes of supplies from Fiji to PNG.
