Minister issues instruction to prevent bullying at teaching hospitals

Jakarta (ANTARA) - The Health Ministry has issued Health Minister's Instruction Number HK.02.01/Menkes/1512/2023 regarding the prevention and handling of bullying of students at government teaching hospitals.

The regulation was signed by Health Minister Budi Gunadi Sadikin on Thursday. "All vertical hospitals in the ministry, which are also educational hospitals, must be able to break bullying practices in specialist medical education programs. We will implement the regulations strictly," the minister announced at a press conference in Jakarta.

He informed that reports and complaints regarding bullying can be sent to the ministry's WhatsApp number 0812-9979-9777 or a new website https://perundungan.go.id, which was scheduled to start operating from Thursday afternoon.

Sadikin said that the forms of bullying experienced by specialist medical students include physical bullying, such as hitting, pushing, biting, grabbing, kicking, locking someone in a room, pinching, scratching, as well as extorting and damaging belongings and sexual harassment.

Meanwhile, verbal bullying includes threatening, humiliating, demeaning, harassing, name-calling, making sarcastic comments, denouncing, intimidating, cursing, and spreading false news, he added.

Cyberbullying involves actions taken to hurt or injure people using electronic media such as conveying unverified news or videos with the aim of provoking or defaming others, Sadikin stated.

There is also non-physical and non-verbal bullying, which involves isolating, ignoring, sending anonymous letters, giving duties beyond reasonable limits, or asking for funding for curricular, extra-curricular activities, or other expenses outside of the established tuition fee.

According to him, complaints lodged on the website will require the victim's name, victim's identity number (optional), perpetrator's name, frequency of occurrence, place of occurrence, name of incident, description of the incident, evidence of incident (optional), contact number, and e-mail to be filled out.

"The message and complaint will be directly received by the Inspectorate General of the Ministry of Health for follow-up," Sadikin informed.

He said that the complete name and identity number of victims have been sought to accelerate the case processing as complaints filed anonymously take a longer time to trace. The website also contains a list of information about bullying, he continued.

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The minister guaranteed that all information collected through the complaints feature will be kept confidential by the Inspectorate General of the Health Ministry. In addition, he informed that the sanctions will range from a written warning, and suspension, to expulsion from the educational institutions. "Sanctions will range from mild, trials, and taken to the Honorary Council of Medical Ethics (MKEK), the Honorary Council of Indonesian Medical Disciplines (MKDKI), and their collegiums," he disclosed.