1 minute ago, frank83628 said:

not sure i remember hearing it quite like that.

safe and effective. was what were were told, adverse effects never mentioned on msm whatsoever, anyone that did suggest that was shot down, attacked and banned from social media, dont remember any politicians warning of adverse effects either

 

 

There's apparently a lot you don't remember.

 

By the way, "safe and effective" doesn't mean, and has never meant, a medication has no side effects, serious or otherwise. It means the benefits of taking it have been found to outweigh the risks, which was the case here.

 

From the CDC circa 2020:

 

3. Like any medicine, vaccines can cause side effects. However, serious adverse events from vaccines are rare.

Most side effects from vaccines, such as pain and redness at the injection site, are mild and go away quickly on their own. Serious adverse events are rare. If you have questions or concerns about a vaccine, talk with your healthcare provider. Learn more about the safety of recommended vaccines.

 

Page last reviewed: February 25, 2020

 

https://www.cdc.gov/patientsafety/features/vaccine-safety.html

 

Coronavirus disease (COVID-19): Vaccines and vaccine safety

5 December 2023

 

Vaccines must be proven safe and effective in large Phase III clinical trials to prove that they meet internationally agreed benchmarks for safety and efficacy before they are introduced in national immunization programs.

 

Independent reviews of the efficacy and safety evidence are required by WHO for each vaccine candidate, including regulatory review and approval in the country where the vaccine is manufactured, before WHO considers it approved for emergency use listing or prequalification.

 

Billions of people have received the COVID-19 vaccine to date, showing that the benefits of COVID-19 vaccinations outweigh the risks of getting ill with COVID-19."

 

https://www.who.int/news-room/questions-and-answers/item/coronavirus-disease-(covid-19)-vaccines

 

1 hour ago, Startmeup said:

I guess there was no way for Astra Zeneca to know that the vaccine was going to cause people harm?

But 24 studies said this would never happen again……

 

The "24 studies" you reference, which were cited earlier in this thread, showed how COVID vaccines reduce the risk of Long COVID in recipients. And said nothing about "this would never happen again."

 

Those studies had/have nothing to do with what you're posting about here.

 

But indeed, ever since the beginning of the pandemic, health authorities have been clear that COVID vaccines could have rare and sometimes serious side effects. But that those, while regrettable, pale in comparison to the tens of millions of lives the vaccines saved from COVID.

 

------------------------------

 

Just remember, for every photo you post of a woman in a hospital bed, let's post millions of photos of people around the world who are still living their lives today because they got vaccinated and didn't end up dying from COVID.

 

Or of the millions more who had the opportunity to get vaccinated against COVID and refused, and ended up paying the price:

 

 

Florida radio host who called himself ‘Mr Anti-Vax’ dies of Covid-19

A conservative radio host from Florida who criticised coronavirus vaccination efforts – and called himself “Mr Anti-Vax” – before contracting Covid-19 himself has died, his station said on Saturday.

 

A statement said: “It’s with great sadness that WNDB and Southern Stone Communications announce the passing of Marc Bernier, who informed and entertained listeners on WNDB for over 30 years. We kindly ask that privacy is given to Marc’s family during this time of grief.”

 

When Bernier was hospitalised with Covid-19, three weeks ago, WNDB operations manager Mark McKinney told local media: “If you’ve listened to his show, you’ve heard him talk about how anti-vaccine he is on the air.”

 

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/aug/29/conservative-radio-host-anti-vaxxer-dies-covid-marc-bernier

 

You (the anti-vaxers here) have got ones and dozens of cases out of (in the case of the UK) 50 million AZ doses given there.

 

I've got a projected 6+ million people worldwide who were kept alive from COVID because they were vaccinated with the AZ vaccine. Let's not forget to balance the scales.

 

Oxford vaccine saved most lives in its first year of rollout

15 Jul 2022

 

Yah, those people are EXACTLY that dumb, swimming in an ocean of misinfo rubbish. And people died because of it. Kudos to the "I did my own research" crowd.

Behavioural interventions to reduce vaccine hesitancy driven by misinformation on social media

BMJ - Published 16 January 2024)

 

"Anti-vaccine campaigns proliferated during the covid-19 pandemic15 with undeniable effects including substantial increases in covid related illness and death.151617 [emphasis added] Even before March 2020, vaccine hesitancy was directly linked to misinformation (false, inaccurate information promoted as factual) spread on social media.18 Once covid-19 reached pandemic status, social media was acknowledged as the epicentre of misinformation leading to hesitancy,1920 and consequently, interventions to tackle hesitancy have globally focused on delivery through social media.2122

 

Despite unprecedented levels of vaccine access and nearly real time communication on the development and availability of vaccines in 2020-21, public health officials struggled to keep pace with misleading or inaccurate content online.23 As guidelines shifted with the emergence of new information, policy decisions were often perceived by individuals and groups who are prone to distrust or refute government messaging as a response not to evidence but to mistakes or lack of expertise."

 

https://www.bmj.com/content/384/bmj-2023-076542

 

Competing interests: All authors confirm that they have no conflicts or competing interests in contributing to this manuscript.

 

 

22 minutes ago, dhupverg said:

 

Do these finger pointing people saying "anti vaxxer" not realize that nearly 100% of the population in the western world has had their childhood vaccines and are not anti vaxxer. 

 

Ya, except for this 30% of U.S. parents who now lean anti-vaxer (or at least vaccine-skeptic) overall!

 

 

May 09, 2024

 

"The authors found that in 2023, 70% of parents and 56% of teenagers felt that it was important teens receive all recommended vaccines to stay healthy. This was a decline from 85% of parents and 82% of teenagers in June 2021."

 

https://www.healio.com/news/pediatrics/20240509/survey-trust-in-vaccines-declines-among-teenagers-parents

 

 

The COVID vaccines were never approved on the basis of their ability to stop transmission of COVID, even though they largely did in the early going. That wasn't even one of the approval criteria.

 

They were approved on the basis of them reducing the risk of people getting sick from and dying from COVID, which they've done extraordinarily well.

Fact Check: Preventing transmission never required for COVID vaccines’ initial approval; Pfizer vax did reduce transmission of early variants

 

29 minutes ago, rattlesnake said:

Friendly reminder from November 2021:

 

https://news.un.org/en/story/2021/11/1106792

 

Given the vast majority of the world has believed this principle and complied accordingly, surely there is no reason for concern anymore? Or were we not told the truth?

 

 

Sounds right to me:

 

COVID vaccines saved 20 million lives in first year, study says

Jun 24, 2022

 

Nearly 20 million lives were saved by COVID-19 vaccines during their first year, but even more deaths could have been prevented if international targets for the shots had been reached, researchers reported Thursday.

...

The researchers used data from 185 countries to estimate that vaccines prevented 4.2 million COVID-19 deaths in India, 1.9 million in the United States, 1 million in Brazil, 631,000 in France and 507,000 in the United Kingdom.

...

Another modeling group used a different approach to estimate that 16.3 million COVID-19 deaths were averted by vaccines. That work, by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation in Seattle, has not been published.

 

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/covid-vaccines-saved-20-million-lives-in-first-year-study-says

 

Vaccine Confidence After COVID-19

October 20, 2023

 

An interview with Ali Mokdad on how the pandemic affected trust in vaccines

 

Think Global Health spoke with Dr. Ali Mokdad, chief strategy officer for population health at the University of Washington and professor of health metrics sciences at IHME, about their findings. 

 

"From a scientific standpoint, the vaccine rollout was done by the books and was safe. There are articles about mRNA and its potential for vaccines and medications from way before I was born, and I’m an old dude with white hair. So this is not a new technology. But it was adapted to provide the vaccine, and two physicians just received a Nobel Prize for that work. We didn’t do a good job of explaining to the public, though, that this has been going on for a long time.  

...

If we hadn’t developed a COVID-19 vaccine, we’d have lost hundreds of millions of people. It saved a lot of lives. Unfortunately, it wasn’t portrayed as having done so."

 

https://www.thinkglobalhealth.org/article/vaccine-confidence-after-covid-19

 

 

WHO chief declares end to COVID-19 as a global health emergency

 

5 May 2023

 

The head of the UN World Health Organization (WHO) has declared “with great hope” an end to COVID-19 as a public health emergency, stressing that it does not mean the disease is no longer a global threat.

...

He said the virus – first made a public health emergency of international concern by the WHO chief on 30 January, 2020 - was here to stay: “It is still killing and it is still changing. The risk remains of new variants emerging that cause new surges in cases and deaths.”

...

For over 12 months, the pandemic “has been on a downward trend”, he said, with immunity increasing due to the highly effective vaccines developed in record time to fight the disease, and infections. Death rates have decreased and the pressure on once overwhelmed health systems, has eased.

 

https://news.un.org/en/story/2023/05/1136367

 

1 hour ago, AreYouGerman said:

Of course the Phillipines has less prostitution. Just compare Angeles vs. Pattaya.

 

Not so sure about that, as per the following:

 

The report also ranked the countries with the highest number of sex workers. Standing at the top is China, with 5 million workers, followed by India (3 million), the US (1 million), the Philippines (800,000), Mexico (500,000), Germany (400,000), Brazil (250,000), Thailand (250,000), Bangladesh (200,000), and South Korea (147,000).

 

https://aseannow.com/topic/1326391-thailand-listed-among-top-10-countries-with-highest-number-of-sex-workers-worldwide/

 

Thanks for helping to reinforce my prior point, as stated by MoPH, that the current COVID surge is creating problems for an already overburdened pubic health operation.

 

But it goes beyond that, as there's been clear and conclusive research that living in areas with poor air quality, such as is the case seasonally in Thailand, makes people MORE susceptible to health problems caused by COVID.  So the two different situations together make things worse!

 

Air pollution exposure linked to more severe COVID-19 outcomes

May 25, 2022

 

Exposure to common air pollutants were associated with more severe outcomes after SARS-CoV-2 infection, according to findings published in the Canadian Medical Association Journal.

 

“Apart from showing that the environment, and especially air pollution, may play a role in contributing to COVID-19 severity during the COVID-19 pandemic, this study enforces the idea that air pollution is pervasive and a silent killer,” Hong Chen, PhD, an adjunct professor in the School of Epidemiology and Public Health at the University of Ottawa in Canada, told Healio. “The association of air pollution and COVID-19 severity reflects the tip of the iceberg of the wide-ranging impacts of air pollution on human health.”

...

Overall, the findings indicate that long-term exposure to PM_2.5 and O₃ was associated with an elevated risk for COVID-19–related hospital admissions; exposure to O₃ was also associated with an elevated risk for death due to COVID-19.

 

https://www.healio.com/news/primary-care/20220525/air-pollution-exposure-linked-to-more-severe-covid19-outcomes

 

AND

 

Air pollution exposure linked to severe COVID-19 outcomes

May 25, 2023

 

Air pollution exposure is associated with a higher risk of experiencing severe outcomes from COVID-19 infections, including intensive care unit (ICU) admissions and death, according to new evidence in Nature Communications from the Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal).

 

While the negative effects of long-term exposure to ambient air pollution on chronic respiratory diseases has long been supported by scientific research, there is less evidence surrounding air pollution exposure and outcomes from reparatory infections.

...

Overall, higher annual average exposure to particle matter and nitrogen dioxide was associated with a greater risk (hazard) of COVID-19–related events. An increase in exposure to particle matter of 3.2 µg/m³ was associated with a 25% increase in hospital admissions (hazard ratio [HR], 1.25, 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.22 to 1.29). Exposure was also associated with an increased risk of ICU admission (HR 1.16; 95% CI, 1.09 to1.24), and death (HR 1.13; 95% CI, 1.07 to 1.19).

 

https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/covid-19/air-pollution-exposure-linked-severe-covid-19-outcomes

 

I guess it's never occurred to some posters here that the peak of Thailand's pollution season this spring (and all the medical problems that creates) happens to overlap in part with the current seasonal peak of COVID illnesses...

 

And both issues together end up landing in the laps of Thailand's hospitals and emergency rooms, each adding to the larger workload burdens they face.

 

36 minutes ago, dinsdale said:

Push, push , push the narrative. 2020 LOL. 

 

The narrative is to recognize that now in 2024 when the Thai MoPH starts talking about (per the OP):

 

"The high number of cases is also taking a toll on healthcare workers who are feeling overwhelmed by the demands."

 

...that they're talking about a real thing that already has been well documented here in Thailand and around the world during the course of the pandemic, as documented by my earlier posts here and cited sources on that subject.

 

 

 

38 minutes ago, dinsdale said:

The thing about studies into this is and has been from the beginning who pays for them.

 

Which in the case of the TWO DOZEN studies that were the subject of the cited article reviewing how vaccination reduces the risk of Long COVID, you have absolutely no idea....

 

But you can continue to talk about it anyway to try to dismiss the findings in the absence of any actual knowledge on the specific studies.

 

Since the start of the pandemic, Thailand has officially had 4.77 million COVID hospitalizations and 34,625 COVID deaths.

 

 

https://ddc.moph.go.th/covid19-dashboard/?dashboard=main

 

I can say with 100% certainty that I've never been a member of either of those groups.

 

4 minutes ago, stoner said:

 

how do you know you will have to stay in the hospital if you get covid ? for that matter unless you test yourself every single day how can you be sure you don't have covid now. 

 

keep in mind a large portion of people who get covid don't show any symptoms.

 

Haven't had a sick day since the start of the pandemic... 

 

I feel both lucky and fortunate, and satisfied I've done everything I could reasonably do to stay out of the hospital or worse.

 

4 hours ago, connda said:

This is probably written by AI as it is using language right out 2020:  "the healthcare system is bracing for the psychological toll of the pandemic.

 

Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic crisis on turnover intention among nurses in emergency departments in Thailand: a cross sectional study

 

2023 Sep 27

 

During the COVID-19 pandemic in Thailand, a large volume of COVID-19 patients were referred to hospital emergency departments (EDs). This increased job demand and job strain among ED nurses, resulting in a high risk of intention to leave their organization.

...

This cross-sectional study investigated 322 ED nurses.

...

During COVID-19 pandemic crisis, 72.8% of ED nurses in dark-red zone areas desired to leave their organization. The factors of motivation, exhaustion, and cognitive impairment positively influenced turnover intention among ED nurses in dark-red zone areas. Low availability of organizational resources was associated with an increase in the turnover intention rate. Maladaptive regulation, exhaustion, and cognitive impairment positively influenced turnover intention among ED nurses in non-red zone areas.

 

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10523753/

 

AND

 

Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on the Hospital and Outpatient Clinician Workforce:

May 3, 2022

 

The COVID-19 pandemic has put extreme stress on the health care workforce in the United States, leading to workforce shortages as well as increased health care worker burnout, exhaustion, and trauma. These pandemic-related challenges have taken place in a context of significant pre-existing workforce shortages and maldistribution, as well as in a workforce where burnout, stress, and mental health problems were already significant problems.

 

https://aspe.hhs.gov/reports/covid-19-health-care-workforce

 

And globally:

 

Health and Care Worker Deaths during COVID-19

 

20 October 2021

 

WHO estimates that between 80 000 and 180 000 health and care workers could have died from COVID-19 in the period between January 2020 to May 2021, converging to a medium scenario of 115 500 deaths¹.

 

https://www.who.int/news/item/20-10-2021-health-and-care-worker-deaths-during-covid-19

 

It's SAD from some of the comments posted in this thread to see how people seem to forget, or try to forget, what the reality of things was.

 

 

People all around the world, including Italy, Spain and Turkey, are gathering on their balconies to applaud the health-care workers on the front lines of the fight against the coronavirus.

 

 

6 minutes ago, stoner said:

 

that's amazing. that also means the title of this thread is a total lie. 12 to 11 is a drop not a surge. 

 

 

 

Reading comprehension...

Thai Medics Warn of Covid Surge with 11 New Deaths

 

The headline is correctly talking about a surge of COVID with 11 new deaths.

 

And I think they've got the surge part pretty well covered:

 

The weekly COVID new hospitalization counts reported by the MoPH during the past nine weeks have been as follows, with the spring surge beginning well before this year's mid-April Song Kran holidays, but then climbing rapidly after they arrived:

 

March 16 -- 501

March 23 -- 630

March 30 -- 728

April 6 -- 774

April 13 -- 849

April 20 -- 1,004

April 27 -- 1,672

May 4 -- 1,792

May 11 -- 1,880

 

But, if someone wanted to be pedantic, they could also correctly point out that weekly COVID death tolls here in recent weeks going from 3 to 9 to 12 to 11 is bit of a surge in itself.

 

27 minutes ago, Startmeup said:

You can post studies until your blue in the face we have seen over the last few years the credibility most studies have nowadays. Im talking real world people here not fairytales from compromised institutions.

Find me one or maybe two, you cant

 

Well,  since the cited article above described a summary review of TWENTY FOUR different studies on how COVID vaccination reduces the risk of Long COVID, you're going to have a lot of reading to do to prove your made-up claim that they're all non-credible and compromised.

 

19 minutes ago, stoner said:

correct me if i am wrong but was last weeks death total not 9 ? so 9 to 11 is a surge ? 

 

No... you're indeed wrong.

 

Two weeks ago was 12. Last week, the most recent week reported today, was 11.

 

 

So the recent progression of weekly COVID deaths has been 3, 9, 12, and now 11.

 

https://ddc.moph.go.th/covid19-dashboard/?dashboard=main

 

 

1 minute ago, 0ffshore360 said:

Can you admit that "peer reviewed " studies that are  accepted for publication in any prominence are almost invariably supportive of the claims of the producers or financially interested parties as to efficacy of such as  the mRNA vaccines

and very reticent in acknowledging the myriad of <perhaps> extraordinary claims related to damage?

Can you nominate, identify, specify a mRNA vaccine that despite the  many years of attempted proven efficacy  has ever been acknowledged and therefore  been purchased  by the WHO for endemic diseases not including covid 19?

 

The world has seen almost 13 BILLION COVID vaccine doses administered in the 3-1/2 years since they first became available in late 2020. Not all mRNA, but increasingly so as time has passed.

 

Good effectiveness in reducing the risk of serious illness and death from COVID, compared to those who are un- or under-vaccinated.  Documented serious side effects exceedingly rare compared to the vast numbers of vaccine doses given.

 

----------------

 

"mRNA vaccines have been studied and researched for quite a few different illnesses, but COVID became the first and largest public deployment of the technology.

https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/treatments/21898-mrna-vaccines

 

 

9 minutes ago, Startmeup said:

Show me one person with "long covid" who is unvaccinated, I beg you.
Rarer than bigfoot and the lochness monster combined 

 

 

Haven't been paying much attention during the COVID pandemic?

 

Review estimates 69% 3-dose vaccine efficacy against long COVID

Much lower long-COVID prevalence among vaccinated

 

The pooled prevalence of long COVID was 11.8% among unvaccinated participants [emphasis added] and 5.3% among recipients of at least two vaccine doses. 

 

https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/covid-19/review-estimates-69-3-dose-vaccine-efficacy-against-long-covid

 

 

20 minutes ago, BangkokReady said:

 

If covid is that dangerous, everyone with it should be isolating until they test negative.

 

From the OP..... though I know of virtually nothing the current Thai government is doing in the way of COVID vaccinations:

 

"Strict preventive measures, including mask-wearing, social distancing, and hand hygiene, are being enforced while vaccination efforts continue."

 

The same things that reduced people's COVID risks in past years are still the ones that reduce your risks today.

 

 

 

40 minutes ago, dhupverg said:

What doesn't make sense is that those who are seriously affected are young and heatlhy,

 

The elderly make up the majority of COVID hospitalizations and deaths these days, even up to two-thirds or so for COVID hospitalizations, depending on the source. But that still leaves a lot of younger people in the remaining one-fourth to one-third of the population who still are getting sick from COVID.

 

Per the U.S. CDC:

 

"During the first seven months of 2023, adults 65 years and older accounted for 63% of hospitalizations and 88% of in-hospital deaths from COVID-19."

 

That means people under 65 accounted for more than one-third of U.S. COVID hospitalizations during that period, and 12 percent of in-hospital COVID deaths.

 

https://www.cdc.gov/ncird/whats-new/changing-threat-covid-19.html

 

3 minutes ago, connda said:

make everyone get shots that don't stop transmission (but makes pharmaceutical companies the big bucks).

 

The COVID vaccines somewhat reduce transmission, especially in the months after vaccination, and more reduces people's risks of getting sick from, hospitalized because of, or dying from COVID.

 

If Thailand had done a better job of keeping its population, or even just the most at risk people, up-to-date with the newest COVID vaccinations, we likely wouldn't be talking about new weekly COVID hospitalizations here having tripled since mid March.

 

Updated COVID-19 vaccines effective against variants, new data show

February 01, 2024

 

The updated COVID-19 vaccines were approximately 54% effective against symptomatic SARS-CoV-2 infection and offered protection against JN.1 and XBB viral lineages, according to early estimates published Thursday by the CDC.

...

Overall, VE was 54% (95% CI, 46%-60%) among people who had recently received an updated COVID-19 vaccine. The researchers found that VE for people aged 18 to 49 years was 57% (95% CI, 48%-65%) and for people aged 50 years and older was 46% (95% CI, 31%-58%).

 

https://www.healio.com/news/infectious-disease/20240201/updated-covid19-vaccines-effective-against-variants-new-data-show

 

Latest COVID vaccine, antivirals lower risk of severe COVID-19, new data show

March 8, 2024

 

According to new research from the Cleveland Clinic published in The Lancet Infectious Diseases, updated COVID-19 vaccines—the monovalent (single-strain) XBB.1.5 shots—reduced the risk of severe COVID-19 by 31%, and the use of antiviral drugs reduced the risk of severe disease by 42%.

...

In patients aged 65 years or older, the HR was 0.66 (95% CI, 0.55 to 0.79) for XBB.1.5 vaccination (34% protection) and 0.52 (0.45 to 0.60) for antiviral treatment (48% protection). In contrast, in patients aged younger than 65 years, the HR was 0.82 (0.59 to 1.15) for XBB.1.5 vaccination (18% protection) and 0.69 (0.57 to 0.82) for antiviral treatment (31% protection).

 

https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/covid-19/latest-covid-vaccine-antivirals-lower-risk-severe-covid-19-new-data-show