KruZik

On 2/29/2020 at 9:05 AM, Boomer6969 said:

Understanding? Dunno, but we could chose between:

a) Authorities are lying, deliberately, to protect the economy,

b) There is a large proportion of asymptomatic carriers in Thailand,

c) The Thais are ineffective in identifying and tracing the cases.

If you asked me I'd say that all a, b, and c are true. 

I think we'd better throw in hot and humid weather into the mix. I know Singapore has similar weather to here..so I don't know. I also think a lack of active testing is another factor.

29 minutes ago, A Los for words said:

The list of high risk countries was published while the teachers and students were already abroad on their half term holidays. It doesn't matter how much the fees are, it doesn't include hindsight. That's why every international school in the country has probably enforced self quarantine.

 

You could argue that there's more chance of the virus spreading if they close schools because no one can police self quarantine, and that it was probably safer to go abroad to Singapore than to hang around in Thailand with Chinese tourists still pottering about.....but that's another debate.

I tried to explain this point in my post below. In a rapidly changing situation, there is no way anyone could have guessed that cases in South Korea would skyrocket, much less that Italy would become a hotbed of disease. As a teacher at one of these schools, personally I decided to stay in Thailand but because I have a baby and didn't fancy exposing her to the airport. Blaming teachers is far too easy to do. By the same token, no Thais should be travelling abroad. Does anyone think that's true? And does anyone think every person arriving in from these 'at risk' countries is effectively self-quarantining? Not to mention the supreme irony of continuing to allow flights from China to land every day.

26 minutes ago, A Los for words said:

Those selfish people who were able to go forward in time, see the list of countries, and then go abroad. How very dare they. They should make a film about such a thing, maybe call it 'Back to the Future'? I suggest you get a dictionary too.

Spot on. My thoughts exactly.

7 minutes ago, Jaswinder said:

I don’t believe Thailand has 42 infections till date. Thailand was first country of COVID-19 infection after China and it was just after 1st death in China. In last 2 months there are regular flights from Mainland which is affected too. Till now Thailand must have close to 10k infections and those infected people may be walking around us. COVID-19 test kid is expensive (6500 baht) and not all can afford. 

Agree it seems impossible that there are only 42 cases here. I've researched this extensively and can only offer two scenarios - 1) The virus cannot survive long enough in Thailand's weather to cause major outbreaks of infection or 2) tests are not being done.

2 hours ago, amdy2206 said:

I can't understand the mentality of these, so called, intelligent people!! Teachers, high risk working with vulnerable kids, travelling to these areas!!! Do they have enough brains to teach???? Exposing their students to this virus. I suggest they are quarrintined and lose their salary!! Let alone lose any respect the school and parents may have given them. SO SELFISH. 

You're getting a little overemotional here. The Thai government issued the directive that Japan, South Korea, Singapore, Hong Kong and Macau were 'at risk' countries on the weekend before schools started up again. If these places were so dangerous, why didn't the government flag them as such much earlier? Then the government added Vietnam and Malaysia to the list on Monday night - equally ridiculous when you consider there are 16 cases in Vietnam compared to 42 here. I don't see you criticising the Thai grandparents who visited Hokkaido in Japan. People make decisions based on the information in front of them - and trying to get accurate information from the Thai authorities is nigh on impossible. In the absence of leadership from the authorities, people must make their own decisions - right or wrong.

5 hours ago, Bundooman said:

It does seem a little odd, doesn't it?

 

Quote: "He said that the quarantined teachers and students were on private half term trips not school trips. Earlier reports that emanated from the Secretary General of the Private Education Commission Attapon Truektrong erroneously suggested that they had taken part in school trips".

 

Sixty teachers all decided to 'privately' go on trips to suspected, infected countries? 

Did they go separately (as individuals or did they go as a group?

Did the school know they were going?

How exactly, was the school involved in these ventures?

Were any of the students accompanying them? This fact wasn't really clear.

Were they educational trips? If so, who paid for them?

Why were they all allowed to go - assuming that they had informed the school beforehand?

More worryingly - did the Sec.Gen. of Private Ed. Com. sanction these trips and were they really, in fact,"School trips?"

 

The school appears to be back pedalling and covering themselves somewhat selfishly in this very vague scenario style 'Kok-up!'. 

150K per term? Not cheap to have the school decide to close...…!

I work at an international school. Half term ran from 14 Feb for a week. At that stage, Japan and South Korea had some cases, but not terribly high. Same with Singapore, Macau and Hong Kong. It was therefore not that obvious that these were unwise destinations to travel to. Personally, my family and I stayed in Thailand as we have a young baby and I didn't want to fly. There is nothing sinister about the trips as you suggest - many teachers use the holidays to explore the region, as I have over the years. Likewise, there are indeed many school trips that take place over these holidays, so I don't think the scenario you're painting of some kind of secretive cock-up is accurate at all. My school has banned international school trips for some time now, but I'm sure you can appreciate it is very difficult to tell someone where to travel or not to travel. Likewise, it is very difficult for the Thai government to enforce their 'self-quarantine' directive. The only way to ensure compliance is to ban travel to these countries outright, which is just not practical. 

36 minutes ago, Mung said:

Society, travel, business and everything else runs along normally with influenza outbreaks. There are also vaccines available for that. If the world just sat back and carried on as normal with the COVID-19 outbreak, it would be a very different picture now

I also wonder about this. Perhaps Thailand's more relaxed approach will prove to be the right one after all, when compared to countries that have caused themselves huge inconvenience and disruption as well as financial pain.

2 minutes ago, kzyswd said:

Can someone help me understand the self quarantine thing. I just found out about it. Do they tell you to quarantine your self when you arrive? Do I need to go through a different lane or something? Will they check on you afterwards?

Im planned to move to Thai soon coming from one of the listed countries. Its not a vacation, I can't cancel it unless I get sick. I can stay at home for 14days but am I allowed to quickly go shopping? Will I be arrested or something?

This is a very new requirement (less than a week) so from what I can see, it isn't nailed down yet. The guidance my school offered was to shop at quiet times, wear a mask (they are promoted here, even though research they only help if you are sick) and not allow people in and out/no visiting. No-one is enforcing this to my knowledge, but I suppose it is just possible that someone could check up on you. If I find out anything more I'll let you know, but try not to worry too much.

1 minute ago, Jimbo53 said:

Why dont the both of you get a life..instead of wasting your time slagging each other off like schoolkids on here !!

Agree with you mate! There are some angry people on here.

33 minutes ago, chickenslegs said:

 

How do the authorities police that instruction? Do you get home visits?

Luckily I'm not in quarantine. It's clearly not enforceable. Not to mention the irony of labelling a country like Vietnam as 'high risk' when Thailand has many more confirmed cases. Politically motivated perhaps.

2 minutes ago, KruZik said:

 

Some posters here are getting a bit aggro when it comes to responding to others' experiences, as though only one kind of response is valid. 

Ridiculously over-dramatic. Don't take trips because 'it could be your last?' I realise the COVID-19 threat is real - I have a young kid and it's worrying - but using that kind of language does not reassure me at all. Instead it makes me think he is not taking the situation seriously at all.

1 hour ago, DrJack54 said:

 

I'm a teacher at an international school and can assure you that if you have returned from Singapore, Malaysia, Vietnam, Japan, South Korean, China, Macau or Hong Kong you must self-quarantine for 14 days. This is a Ministry of Education directive and obviously applies to students as well as staff.

1 minute ago, DrJack54 said:

 Clearly your a farang with a passport. Most Thai don't even possess one. BTW Google % USA folk have a pp. You will be surprised. 

Anyway back to thread. Unless he declares his travel movements, no way of requesting anything. 

Agree he should have been honest about his movements. And yes, I am a farang with a passport, but he also must have had one otherwise he couldn't have travelled to Japan. But anyway. Point is, his refusal to cooperate initially has created risk of infection for many people. I'm a teacher and I know only too well what fertile soil a school is for the spreading of diseases.

47 minutes ago, Russell17au said:

It is normal circumstances not for him to carry his passport around with him so it could not be presented in a minute as you say. Yes, It is crucial but he still does not have to carry his passport with him. His passport could be in his home an hour away. You do not know where his passport is and even in unusual circumstances Thai's do not have to carry their passports around in their own country, so the only thing that could be done was to request him to return with his passport but that would release him out in the public again

Don't get me wrong, he should have been upfront about where he had been and saved everyone a lot of hassle.

49 minutes ago, Russell17au said:

Why? He is a Thai and he does not have to carry his passport around in Thailand.

Under normal circumstances, I'd agree. But here, where the man's whereabouts are a crucial piece of the puzzle, I'd have thought it was a reasonable request.

23 minutes ago, hotchilli said:

And what was the benefit of denying where he had been... complete and utter selfishness!

Through his thoughtless actions he could have infected many people... I do hope the health minister takes him to task and makes it abundantly clear... THIS WILL NOT BE TOLERATED!

Could have just asked for his passport snd obtained confirmation of his whereabouts in about a minute.

Surely a 5 minute passport check would have clarified where the man had been and when? Or am I missing something?

13 hours ago, Sunderland said:

If they are not hiding them, then they are clearly not testing many people. About 1,500 tests since the beginning of January. The <deleted> will hit the fan very soon.

 

http://rocs.hu-berlin.de/corona/

Thailand is expected to be the most at risk country outside China. But you can't report cases if you don't test enough people. Simple.

Sounds like a reasonable explanation to me. Agree with others that a large number of confirmed sick people in hospital would be hard to hide. If you don't test them, you can get away with calling their illnesses something else. Makes sense.

8 hours ago, Traubert said:

I did say a month ago that this was a strain of flu to be feared as many of the other strains should be but there was no need to panic. Great exception was taken to it.

Simply not true. Influenza has a mortality rate far lower than 1%, whereas this virus is in the 2 to 3% range. While it's true that seasonal flu is a killer, it doesn't kill as many as COVID-19 seems to. Having said that, we don't know the true number of infections - there are probably thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of mild cases and once taken into account, this would lower the fatality rate considerably. So right now, it's hard to tell, but the current figures support a higher death rate for COVID-19:

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/02/03/the-flu-has-already-killed-10000-across-us-as-world-frets-over-coronavirus.html

It was clear that as soon as cases abroad increased, the deaths would come. A grim assessment, but one that is being borne out by the facts. 

4 minutes ago, Mung said:

???? I think they simply don't trust the figures, like most of the world at this point. I am worried about this though, Thailand has lost more face in the last month than they have across the last decade; something is going to snap 

Agree the figures are far from credible, but it's odd that they'd single Thailand out. Do they know something we don't? Or - as others have suggested - is a big announcement of cases coming up that can be conveniently blamed on travellers returning to Thailand who did not self-quarantine? Another possibility is that UAE citizens returning from Thailand were found to be infected..

Ban applies to Malaysia and Vietnam as of tonight. Also: UAE bans citizens from flying to Iran and Thailand. Iran I can understand, but Thailand? https://www.jpost.com/Breaking-News/UAE-bans-travel-to-Iran-Thailand-due-to-coronavirus-fears-2-sick-in-Oman-618617