Several months have passed since Covid-19 first entered Indonesia. New cases keep popping up and many people have become victims. The Covid-19 pandemic has not shown any signs of ending anytime soon. There have been many methods used to deal with its spread, starting from making public compliance policies, making health protocols, and efforts to make vaccines, but until now it has not been resolved. On September 22 2020, it was reported that the number of corona cases in Indonesia had reached 248,852 with 9,677 deaths. Meanwhile, the number of cases of patients who have been declared cured is 180,797 people (BNPB, 2020).
As the number of cases increases, the Covid-19 referral hospitals have begun to be overwhelmed due to the limited facilities and human resources they have. The thing that is most feared is when the patient capacity at the hospital is full so that they are no longer able to accept patients to get proper service. In Jakarta, on September 11 2020 to be exact, there were a total of 727 ICU beds in 67 COVID-19 referral hospitals. However, as many as 460 beds have been used. Then, there were 5,314 beds available in isolation rooms but 3,151 beds have been used in 67 COVID-19 referral hospitals (Liputation 6, 2020). In addition to these problems, the death of many health workers, especially nurses, also had a broad impact. This is because the increasing number of cases will increase the workload of health workers, especially if there is a shortage of nursing professionals.
Students as a group of educated people have many roles that they can do. These roles include being an agent of change and social of control. Students can also be a group that helps in the process of handling Covid-19, especially for nursing students. The way that can be done is by providing promotive and preventive actions to the public so that they have a good understanding of the current pandemic situation. The participation given by nursing students will more or less lighten the burden on nurses. In addition, nursing students can also feel the struggle of their profession, which is currently struggling as the front guard in handling Covid-19 patients.
One of them, Muhamad Alfian, a Bachelor of Nursing student, used the opportunity during the pandemic to remain productive by participating in the E-Speech competition. E-Speech is a means for nursing students to express ideas based on a critical mindset through the preparation of essays and speeches in the form of orations in good and correct Indonesian. This activity was held last October.
Furthermore, what nursing students can do to contribute to increasing public awareness is through programs provided by the Indonesian Ministry of Education and Culture such as Student Creativity Week (PKM) and the Holistic Village Development and Empowerment Program (PHP2D). These two programs are programs aimed at enabling students to carry out their roles in the Tri Dharma of Higher Education, namely Education and Teaching; Research and development; Community service. This could be an opportunity for nursing students to create programs related to community empowerment. Through this program, students will get more support in contributing to society, especially in forming public awareness of Covid-19. (Report, Muhammad Alfian)