Bkk Brian

Wording now changing a little to 'hopes' and provided no new serious clusters................ The government hopes to reopen Bangkok and some towns in four provinces to foreigners without a quarantine requirement from November 1, government spokesman Thanakorn Wangboonkongchana said on Saturday. The towns waiting to reopen are Muang, Mae Rim, Mae Taeng and Doi Tao in Chiang Mai, Hua Hin in Prachuap Khiri Khan, Cha-am in Phetchaburi and Pattaya City, Bang Lamung and Sattahip in Chonburi. “These places will be reopened provided there are no big or serious infection clusters between now and November 1,” he said. “The other conditions for visitors are that they must be fully jabbed and test negative for Covid-19 before arrival.” https://www.nationthailand.com/in-focus/40007279

UNICEF delivers 550 oxygen concentrators to help treat #COVID19 patients. UNICEF would like to thank our partners and donors for your support, and we are determined to do everything we can to help save lives and minimize the COVID-19 impact on children and families. https://twitter.com/UNICEF_Thailand/status/1446431588196126722

The steady increase in cases this last week will as we know have a lag effect on an increase in icu's and deaths. Thats the unfortunate reality, still far from over yet. Those being treated in a real hospital: 5th Oct = 36,649 6th Oct = 38,301 7th Oct = 39,982 8th Oct = 41,057 9th Oct = 41,883 Its not clear why this is increasing aside from the simple fact its more cases entering hospitals for treatment

Yes its a difficult decision. My daughter is 13 and been going to an International school here since she was 4 years old, her Thai is useless, to the point that she really cannot speak any at all when in public. However she will be going to the UK to study at UNI there and then we are not sure if she will stay there with our extended family or return. If it was certain that she was going to stay in Thailand then I also would suggest a 'good' bi lingual school.

You missed the "fully open" statement I made, ie without all the restrictions that are currently in place

Whats going to happen next year sometime when they really do fully open? Will they say we were only kidding ya before..........

PCR test positive cases, total of 10,630 official new infections, with 67 of those from prison and 10,563 from the community. 73 official covid deaths recorded. Back down to double digits a welcome sign. Rapid tests positive cases, 7,421 bringing the unofficial total to 18,051 https://ddc.moph.go.th/covid19-dashboard/ Last 7 days Ventilator Capacity: 03/10/21 = 712 04/10/21 = 719 05/10/21 = 701 06/10/21 = 720 07/10/21 = 715 08/10/21 = 682 09/10/21 = 677 Rolling 7 day average (up to 7th Oct) which includes prison cases and bar chart of community cases from daily official announcements. https://ourworldindata.org/coronavirus/country/thailand

Yes of course its open, its also....................... Thailand: the country with the most complicated entry restrictions on Earth Be warned that the required ‘certificate of entry’ is more extensive than the Passenger Locator Forms you may be used to, requiring applicants to upload travel insurance details, vaccination proof, testing payment proof, hotel reservations, plane tickets and passport details. A quick internet search reveals angry travellers describing the form as “complicated”, with one Facebook user saying they “gave up”. However, while holidays to Thailand are now feasible, they are far from straightforward. Tourists must travel directly to a small number of 'sandbox' destinations (generally islands), staying there for seven days before being able to travel elsewhere in the country. https://uk.style.yahoo.com/thailand-country-most-complicated-entry-130813731.html

Half a billion delivered globally at cost price is completely separate to the 100 million that are being donated free. I've already provided one link for that but here's another, there are plenty more: The cost of the vaccines will be officially classified as "overseas development aid", which means it forms part of the foreign aid budget

Thai Civil Court rejects plea to suspend public gathering restrictions The court said that COVID-19 infections are still spreading, despite the restrictions issued by the prime minister by virtue of the Emergency Decree and intended limit further impacts on the country’s economy. Responding to the claim by the petitioners that there is no solid evidence to prove that public gatherings cause the spread of the disease, the court said that the gatherings of many people for any reason risk the spread of the disease. https://www.thaipbsworld.com/thai-civil-court-rejects-plea-to-suspend-public-gathering-restrictions/

100 million in total free donations https://reliefweb.int/report/world/uk-begins-donating-millions-covid-19-vaccines-overseas-0

Donations are free from the UK, they are donating 100 million with over 80% going to covax and the remainder to individual country donations as it did to Thailand. The cost for this is being covered by the UK Official Development assistance budget.

Yes my daughter, 13, in Phuket on Sunday

Does China recognize AZ from the UK for entry there?

The Federation of Thai Industries (FTI) is concerned that tourists may not be interested in Thailand if the country takes too long to open its doors. FTI chairman Suphan Mongkolsuthee said it is safe for Thailand to open since 40 to 50 per cent of its population has been vaccinated. Also, he said, the number of daily cases has dropped, and Thailand has the facilities to treat Covid-19 patients. However, he said, the authorities should speed up the vaccination rate in the business sector before reopening the country. https://www.nationthailand.com/in-focus/40007232

Not a lot changed in Thailand, they removed 47 countries from the red list leaving only Columbia, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Haiti, Panama, Peru and Venezuela. This was more of a streamline sweep for their return to new normal.

Weekly trends with no useless comparisons to the UK, Thailand only WHO Thailand Latest Situation Update, weekly trends and Analysis WEEKLY TRENDS The number of new community acquired cases continues to decrease, though the rate of decrease has slowed down decreasing by 5% compared to 11% of the previous week. Case counts remain high with an average of 10,445 per day for the last 7 days. The number of deaths continues to decrease with an average of 99 deaths per day compared to 120 per day of the previous week.However deaths remains high and 5 times greater than the average of 19 deaths per day during 3rd wave April to June. Severe cases (decreasing by 7%), ventilated cases (2%) continue to decrease, though the rate of decrease has slowed down over the last few weeks and counts remain high. ANALYSIS Thailand may be over the worst, for now. However, there remains a long way to go, cases and deaths remain very high, many times greater than the previous peak in the 3rd wave in April to June. This includes the number of active cases including those that require direct medical care with an average of almost 111,000 active cases per day over the last week. Severe and ventilated cases, in particular, while decreasing the rate of decrease has slowed down a great deal and continue to present a high workload for front-line health care professionals. https://www.who.int/thailand/emergencies/novel-coronavirus-2019/situation-reports

PCR test positive cases, total of 11,140 official new infections, with 72 of those from prison and 11,062 from the community. 116 official covid deaths recorded. Third day of triple digits. Rolling average 7 day chart taking a spike up. Rapid tests positive cases, 5,225 bringing the unofficial total to 16,365 https://ddc.moph.go.th/covid19-dashboard/ Last 8 days Ventilator Capacity: 01/10/21 = 709 02/10/21 = 725 03/10/21 = 712 04/10/21 = 719 05/10/21 = 701 06/10/21 = 720 07/10/21 = 715 08/10/21 = 682 Rolling 7 day average (up to 6th Oct) which includes prison cases and bar chart of community cases from daily official announcements. https://ourworldindata.org/coronavirus/country/thailand

No as far as I know this is currently the only venue doing this. We have family membership there so go around once a week or so.

Good news, I see they’re not accepting Sinovac or Sinopharm as one of those approved vaccines though. No surprise there.

Feel free to attend a covid delta party to contract the virus and see how it works out for you. Report back on findings……..

In Phuket, Bluetree which is a large water park/lagoon with restaurants and activities have had this in place for over a month. must be double vaxxed or produce negative test result. This is for all nationalities.

The order was due to the Covid-19 clusters found among drinkers that had been gathered in various places in the province. The governor said that the officials are currently unable to control the spreading of the virus.Therefore, the sale, distribution, exchange of all types of liquor and alcohol in department stores, shopping centers, community malls General stores, grocery stores, convenience stores, restaurants or any gathering place is prohibited, said the governor. https://www.nationthailand.com/in-focus/40007173

Effective today, Chanthaburi has banned all sales of alcohol until further notice. Including all stores. They state this will help stop Covid-19 and parties they claim are fueling more cases. https://twitter.com/The_PattayaNews/status/1445971173490118660

Quoting rankings between UK and Thailand when we know that’s an irrelevant metric when the testing in both countries is so vastly different. It does puzzle me why people do that. It’s not a competition. Regardless to get some perspective on the real numbers here both cases and deaths then the below charts gives some insight. The Institute for Health and Metrics Evaluation estimates the true number of cases in Thailand currently at around 40,000 and you can also see in the chart that this is currently on a declining trend but has leveled out. Now compare that with Thailand’s Excess deaths and the charts correspond almost exactly with a sharp rise but the deaths also now on a decline. The excess deaths were at a peak of 37% mor than the previous 5 years in August and now showing at 20% more. More than double the amount of officially recorded covid deaths. In countries where testing is low such as Thailand excess deaths majority proportions will be covid related along with those who were unable to access health care due to full hospitals. https://ourworldindata.org/covid-models#institute-for-health-metrics-and-evaluation-ihme https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/excess-mortality-p-scores-average-baseline?country=~THA