blackprince

The farm I live on has been in operation for over 50 years my friend. Successfully providing numerous goods that you have probably bought in the supermarket, assuming you live in Thailand.

The obsession of first world commenters with Texan style politicised anti-vaxx is blinding so many people to the real issues in the undeveloped world. Yes vaccine hesitancy exists everywhere to a point (often a very small point), but that's not the critical issue in undeveloped nations. From Quartz Africa – Oct 26 2021 “The reason for the underreporting and lack of testing is the same: Limited healthcare resources. Most African countries lack basic healthcare infrastructures, such as hospitals or even clinics outside cities, making covid-19 tests and diagnoses harder to come by.” “World Health Organization (WHO) data found that fewer than 15% of covid-19 cases in African countries are correctly reported.” https://qz.com/africa/2079064/only-one-in-seven-cases-of-covid-19-in-africa-is-reported/ I'm also very surprised that so many posters seem to be blind to the west's failure to honour its covid pledge; this has been widely reported in the UK's liberal press since almost as long as covid vaxxes have been available. The critical issue in the undeveloped world is not vaxx resistance, it's lack of vaccines. People and governments are desperate for vaccines, but cannot get them due to well-documented western hoarding. if sufficient vaccines were available tomorrow the majority would get vaxxed very willingly; then and only then should we waste so much hot air on politicised anti-vaxx.

I appreciate your reply PST, thanks. In my part of Thailand the 1st crop has not yet been cut. I know that in the south the 1st crop has been cut (weather noticeably warmer down there for several months of the year), but I didn't know that it was being retailed yet. As you rightly say, if it's legally for sale in Thailand the THC count would be very low. As I mentioned earlier, I live on an organic farm that is licensed to grow medicinal CBD, so I do know quite a lot about how the industry is organised, but I don't claim to know everything that's going on in the industry all over the country 555 Seed varieties for legal licensed growth are strictly controlled by the authorities. I have tried early test releases of both oil and tincture from a hospital here, and there was a mild psychotropic effect, very mild. Nothing like the full on THC effect that some people here might be expecting from skunk-type varieties, nothing like it at all.

Good point. I posted a while back that last year certain antisocial Brits in the UK were jailed for spitting on other people's faces and shouting "now you've got covid", or something similar. Whether the spitters actually had covid or not I can't remember. Some of these yobs as we affectionately call them were daft enough to spit on cops' faces too. I can't remember whether they got a longer jail term for that or not.

Ok. Was it a Thai product or imported?

Glad to see the debate has been elevated Jeff ???? Liao is basically paraphrasing John Stewart Mill's "harm principle", which is a central tenet of the political philosophy known as liberalism and was first proposed by English philosopher John Stuart Mill over 250 years ago. However, some believe the harm principle is not designed to guide the actions of individuals but to restrict the scope of criminal law and government restrictions of personal liberty. It's hard to enough to get consensus here on simple things like stats. Getting consensus on philosophy and ethics, sheeesh good luck with that. Even Plato and Socrates couldn't agree 555

Could you confirm where you got that photo from or where you took it? thanks

Ah you remember my previous post. Very good. It's a health-investment product sold by a Thai company in Thailand and gives me worldwide cover. I actually bought it for the investment return rather than the health cover, because like a lot of people who've never had to go into hospital, I had the underlying assumption that I was invulnerable lol. But actually when you get down to it, there's isn't a huge amount of difference between assurance and insurance. The key differences are (1) the payment schedule (2) the term (3) the payout trigger. Both products are designed by actuaries of course, in conjunction with the marketing dept.

It's a good question and one that might help others. No, my condition was not pre-existing. And the premiums did not go up. In fact they will never go up, because... The policy is a life assurance investment product. It lasts for life, and I purchased it around 14 years ago. There are no annual premiums. This type of policy is quite common in my native UK. Back in 1990 I was a middle manager in a Life & Pensions company (that's assurance rather than insurance), so I felt pretty confident in what I was buying, although the contract was only in Thai, but I did have good translator lawyer to assist, plus a genuinely knowledgeable saleswoman. This type of product, being essentially an investment product, is offered during a fixed time window. The window for my particular policy was 3 or 6 months, I can't remember exactly, and closed c 14 years ago. Again, this is, or was, quite common in the UK. Needless to say, it wasn't cheap, but it does have a good investment return in addition to comprehensive health cover for life.

The focus of 1st world commenters on politicised anti-vaxx simply doesn't address the real issues facing the undeveloped world. Here's yet another example of what I mean - this time from Nature - 03 November 2021 : "Fowotade’s troubles mirror those faced by other trials in Africa — posing a major problem for those countries in the continent that have been unable to secure enough vaccines against COVID-19. Only 2.7% of people in Nigeria, the continent’s most populous country, have been at least partially vaccinated. That’s just slightly lower than the average rate for low-income countries. Estimates suggest that it could take until at least September 2022 for African nations to obtain enough doses to fully vaccinate 70% of the continent’s population." https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-02995-5 Yes there is vaccine hesitancy in the undeveloped world (as most everywhere else), but it's not quantifiable because the administrative infrastructure for collecting such stats does not exist. But much more importantly, the critical issue right now is lack of vaccines and lack of facilities to roll out a vaccination programme effectively.

The critical problem in sub-saharan Africa, as in most of the undeveloped world, is lack of access to vaccines. I've posted numerous links to confirm that over the last week or two, and several more today. Once the west has stopped hoarding vaccines and made good on its pledge to vaccinate the world, and perhaps waived covid vaccine patents as requested by the WHO among others, then we can start to address the issue of residual vaccine hesitancy in the undeveloped world. Apart from anything else, much of the undeveloped world lacks the administrative infrastructure to gather reliable stats, never mind roll out a vaccine programme, even assuming the west made good its pledge. The focus on politicised anti-vaxx is a 1st world luxury.

The global problem is shortage of vaccines. The problem in some US states is lack of willing arms. Putin's Russia is as untypical as Texas 555 (though for different reasons I'm sure). Yes, Germany has got to the level of vaccination penetration that vaccine hesitancy is a factor, France too I believe. But most of the world is a very long way from that. Anyway, weekends are a particularly busy time for me, so I'll have to go, cheers.

I have cast no personal aspersions about you. I think I've counted 3 that you've made about me. You obviously have an unusual definition of the meanings of "fact" and "claim" too. And I note you have not even attempted to answer the OP's question. There is no government budget for foreign teachers in government schools, that's not how foreign teachers in government schools are funded. Period

Again, let's not oversimplify. In the UK "nine in 10 of those aged 12 or over having had a single jab and eight in 10 having had a second, the focus has shifted to boosters," (BBC) But the big problem with boosters in the developed world is that there will be even less vaccines available in the undeveloped world. The main cause by far of lack of vaccination in the undeveloped world has been western hoarding, this has been known for the last year since vaccines became available. And boosters for the west will only exacerbate this problem. There is a very serious problem of politicised anti-vaxx in the US. That is not the main issue in the rest of the world. https://www.bbc.com/news/health-55274833 https://www.bbc.com/news/health-55274833

I never said it was a fact. I said it was an unsubstantiated claim based on hearsay, which it clearly is. And the OP still has not said where he heard the hearsay, even though several people have asked him. And he has made yet another unsubstantiated claim about salary differentials and given a document reference as supposed supporting evidence, however the document doesn't make any statement about this second claim. Like many such posts here, it seems to be driven by a dissatisfaction with pay, The OP will never resolve that kind of dissatisfaction on this forum, as none of us is his paymaster. But enough of this diversion, and back to the key question. There is no government budget for foreign teachers in government schools, period.

Good post Jeff. I'm sure there is "a fair amount of apathy and vaccine hesitancy", there often is in populations who feel disconnected from their government. But around 70% of South Africans remain unvaccinated, and I'd genuinely be very surpised if that can all be explained by apathy and hesitancy. My guess is that apathy and hesitancy is not a limiting factor yet in the vaccine rollout in SA, but that the limiting factor is the lack of facilities as per the NYT article. But beyond all that there is the elephant in the room of western hoarding. These problems were first predicetd a year ago when the vaccines were first available for consumption. I've been slowly compiling a post about vaccine hesitancy and its correlation to half a dozen factors. Eventually I'll get around to posting it.

I think it's quite hard to make generalisations... Last year was the first time in my life I stayed overnight in hospital - I was there 5 weeks. In the first week I tried two different private hospitals, but I moved to the regional government hospital because it had better facilities for my illness, and the service was much better - I felt that I was being viewed more as a human being than as an ATM. The medicines were less expensive in the government hospital (for the same brand), but the private room was about twice as expensive in the government hospital, the technology I needed was roughly similar in price as far as I remember. The total bill was around 1 million baht, which my Thai health insurer paid promptly to the hospitals. Apart from verifying who I was I didn't have to get involved in the payments at all. A friend of similar age has racked up well over 1 million baht as an outpatient over a longer period of time. He paid himself as he did not have insurance. I'm sure people living in different regions have different experience, but as I said "I think it's quite hard to make generalisations..."

The WHO Ambassador for Global Health Financing also said "In the absence of mass vaccination, Covid is not only spreading uninhibited among unprotected people but is mutating, with new variants emerging out of the poorest countries and now threatening to unleash themselves on even fully vaccinated people in the richest countries in the world." Like everywhere in the world Africa will have its share of vaccine hesitancy. But the issue right now is the west's hoarding. This has been stated repeatedly as a risk over the last year. https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/covid-omicron-variant-no-surprise-25560633

The WHO Ambassador for Global Health Financing urged recently that "More than 100,000 lives can be saved in Africa by undertaking the emergency airlift of 240m unused vaccines in the next fortnight". No one listened. The situation in Africa will only get worse as a consequence. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/oct/17/gordon-brown-urges-emergency-covid-vaccine-airlift-to-africa

As I've pointed out 4 times now in the last 2 days, the NYT claims that the issue in SA is lack of facilities to deliver the jabs. The NYT calls this an "over supply" issue. I have already linked the article. It's a complex issue which does not lend itself to bite sized analysis, which is one reason why so much of the social media discussion gets out of kilter so quickly.

Yes I understand that. But I'd add that it's not as simple as a nationality rule. The guidelines for foreign teacher salaries in government schools include several factors.

The issue in Africa was predicted by the WHO Ambassador for Global Health Financing as a consequence of the west's hoarding of vaccines. He has been making this point ever since covid vaccines were first released, about a year now. https://www.theguardian.com/society/2021/sep/09/gordon-brown-exhorts-west-to-stop-hoarding-vaccines

The topic of this thread is "From what I understood, schools could apply to the ministry of education for a budget of 50,000 baht per month to pay for a foreigner teacher. Is this still currently the case? " The answer is - it was never the case, because that's not how funding for foreigners in government schools works. Re the OP's reference to "Table of Income for Criteria 2.1(2) Annexed to Order No. 327/2557 of the Royal Thai Police Bureau dated June 30, 2014)" it makes no reference to differential salaries for foreign teachers based on nationality. But that's irrelevant to the original question of where does the money come from anyway, so I'm not going to go there.

The OP says this "From what I understood, schools could apply to the ministry of education for a budget of 50,000 baht per month to pay for a foreigner teacher. " This is an unsubstantiated claim based on hearsay.

Out of courtesy, I've taken the time to read your recommended "Table of Income for Criteria 2.1(2) Annexed to Order No. 327/2557 of the Royal Thai Police Bureau dated June 30, 2014." I have not found anything about "Legally, I do know for any business to employ a foreigner eg Native uk, aussie, american, canadian it is 50,000 per month but if you are from another country like Philippines the salary scales drops down to 35,000 per month", or anything about rules for salaries for foreign teachers. I can tell you quite categorically there is no government budget for foreign teachers in Thai government schools. That's not how funding for foreigners in Thai government schools works. I'll add that each Thai government school is administered by 1 of around 10 government bodies. None of these bodies draws on a government budget for foreign teachers because there is no such budget. You have still not told us where you heard the hearsay that inspired you to start this thread, but whoever gave it to you is incorrect.