British Consular Team

Let's begin this update with news about vaccine registration for foreigners in Thailand. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs launched online registration from 1st August for foreign residents over the age of 18 to register for a first dose of COVID-19 vaccination. We have been informed by the Ministry of Public Health that more than 5,600 British residents in Thailand have received their vaccines since the roll-out of national vaccination programme began. We know there is a long way to go and that registration is still difficult for many people, and we are continuing our work with Thai authorities on that. You may have also seen our announcement about the UK donations of 415,000 Astra Zeneca doses to Thailand. These arrived on 3rd August 2021. They will go into Thailand’s national vaccination programme where it will help ensure vulnerable people of all nationalities in the country are vaccinated. We are still getting a lot of enquiries about vaccines, which is understandable. In the past two weeks, we have answered 152 enquiries. We read every enquiry and we try to give an individual response to each one, even if we use similar language. We also now have more than 500 subscribers to our vaccine bulletin where we provide regular updates about the vaccination in Thailand. You can sign up by sending an email to [email protected] . And our travel advice will be updated as further information becomes available about the national vaccination programme and other measures here, so do please sign up to get email notifications. Casework wise, in the last two weeks the team have provided 49 notarial services and dealt with 39 urgent cases. This included providing support to the families of 12 British people who passed away, dealing with 4 arrests and helping coordinate with hospitals for 5 British people who were hospitalised. It’s important to note too that due to Covid-19 restrictions in Bangkok, we have suspended in-person notarial services until further notice. If you have an emergency, please call 02 305 8333. Finally, we have just published a new list of mental health facilities in Thailand. We are working on other guides too so watch this space.

We've updated our Travel Advice pages with additional information on how to get a COVID-19 vaccine if you live in Thailand ('Coronavirus' page)https://www.gov.uk/foreign-travel-advice/thailand

This is a fair point about complaints. You do have the right to complain to us about decisions made by the UK government that affect you and we will relay those complaints to the appropriate authorities where possible.

There are a lot of questions and comments about C19 vaccinations across various topics on our pages. It's difficult for us to find them all, so we can respond (where we can). Can I suggest to the members of this forum that where possible you post your messages here, so they are in one place and therefore a bit easier to spot and answer?

There have been a lot of comments and questions about the Thai vaccine programme on the Forum. As the Consul here, and head of the Consular team, I’d like to respond to some of these. A lot of people have noted serious difficulties with the roll-out of the Thai programme and told us that the Ambassador/Embassy are doing nothing/should do more. We know this is a very difficult and worrying time and people are really concerned. The Ambassador has spoken to Thai authorities about the vaccination programme several times, including when he met the Prime Minister recently. He did it again at a meeting with the Foreign Minister on 28th June. In his discussions he has emphasised the importance of consistency in the application of the government’s policy on equal access, an efficient registration system and clear communications. The Embassy is also in constant discussions with the Ministry of Public Health and other authorities at several levels, including on individual cases involving vulnerable British nationals. Many people continue to ask if we can arrange vaccines for British people in Thailand. There is no change to the UK government's position on this. The NHS does not provide healthcare outside the UK so it can't offer vaccines to British people who live overseas, including here. This is not an excuse – it’s the UK government’s policy. We are also getting a lot of requests for help from vulnerable British nationals. These will always be a priority for us. We can’t provide vaccines ourselves but we will provide all the help we can to get vulnerable British people vaccinated under the Thai scheme, and to support them with other needs also. We have seen a lot of comments on the forum about other countries providing vaccines and asking what the British Embassy is doing. Our position continues to be that the Thai government is responsible for the roll-out of vaccines in Thailand and that the UK cannot provide them. Thailand has made it clear that the programme will cover foreigners as well as Thais; our job is to do what we can to help that happen. It’s worth noting as well that each country will make its own decisions on whether it can also offer vaccines, and almost all are telling their nationals to obtain vaccines in the Thai programme. Some people have registered for our bulletin then complained that it does not help them. The purpose of the bulletin is to gather together all the information we can, from public sources, from our discussions with Thai authorities and from our own network, and share this. As you will appreciate, this is difficult as the situation changes constantly, but we are doing our best to share accurate and useful information. The bulletin cannot ensure the Thai vaccination programme works, or serve any other purpose than inform you of the situation. If you no longer wish to receive it, let us know. But as someone once put it, please do not blame the weatherman for the quality of the weather. Two final points. The first is to repeat that we really appreciate how worrying this time is and we are doing all we can to ensure that Brits in Thailand get vaccines as part of Thailand’s programme. We understand that the news that we've offered Embassy staff vaccines is difficult for some people to accept, but we must fulfil our duty of care to our staff. In the same way as the Thai authorities have the responsibility to provide vaccines and other healthcare to everyone resident in Thailand. Secondly, I created these pages to start a conversation with the British community on this Forum, and to answer questions. We’ve managed to field a lot, and there have been some excellent discussions (and we are very grateful to everyone who has engaged positively, including people who challenge our position). I am still committed to the aims we have for these pages, but the Embassy has a zero tolerance policy to abuse and I will not allow my team to be exposed to it (about vaccines or any other issues). So I will continue to report posts that are abusive to moderators for this forum, and if I feel the levels become unacceptable, I’ll look at other measures, including the team no longer getting involved in discussions on certain topics here. Paul

The best source of information for this common question is: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/support-for-british-nationals-abroad-a-guide If anything is unclear, post it here and we'll do our best to clarify it for you.