TallGuyJohninBKK

The wife and I were out and around the Victory Monument area in BKK this past weekend... and I'd say 95% of the Thais we saw walking around both outside and inside in shops and stores were wearing various versions of face masks... and I was wearing my standard 3M N95 mask, as always. Totally opposite situation around my home neighborhood where there are a lot of tourists from East and West, with most farang tourists especially not wearing them. It's good to see the Thais trying to be mindful of protecting both their own health and that of those around them by masking up... unlike most of the tourist folks from the West.

The COVID vaccines reduce the likelihood of the vaccinated person becoming infected... so they prevent infection for some, but not all. The specific rate of vaccine efficiency (VE) against regular infection depends on the strain of the virus circulating, the particular vaccine(s) previously given, how many doses and how long prior, and various other factors. Lately, with the new Omicron variants' increased vaccine evasion capabilities, the prevention of infection VE numbers are relatively low, unlike at the beginning of the pandemic. But the prevention of serious illness and death VE rates have remained very high, especially for those who have received vaccine booster shots as recommended. From the UK Health agency's latest COVID vaccine monitoring report for March: "several studies have provided evidence that vaccines provide some protection against infection. Uninfected individuals cannot transmit. Therefore, the vaccines also provide some protection against transmission. There may be an additional benefit, beyond that due to prevention of infection, if some of those individuals who become infected despite vaccination are also at a reduced risk of transmitting (for example, because of reduced duration or level of viral shedding)." https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1139990/vaccine-surveillance-report-2023-week-9.pdf

A few months back, the Embassy told me, in person only in urgent/emergency circumstances.

I worked at 7/11 in the U.S. as a teenager and it helped finance my college education. The company (Southland Corp.) started out as a U.S. company in the 1940s and 1950s... the Japan part came much later in the 1970s. "By 1945 Southland owned stores scattered over north-central Texas. These stores offered convenient hours—operating from seven in the morning until 11 at night—seven days a week. When the Tracy-Locke firm was commissioned to create a new name, they chose “7-Eleven” to emphasize the company’s commitment to serving customers. At this time Southland remodeled all 7-Eleven stores, doubling the amount of floor space at each retail outlet." Southland extended its area of operations outside of Texas during the late-1950s when John Thompson, now vice-president, introduced 7-Eleven stores in Virginia, Maryland, and eastern Pennsylvania...." etc etc... https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences-and-law/economics-business-and-labor/businesses-and-occupations/southland-corp

The quote from Ardern above is a cobbled together version of a much longer statement she made back in 2020 at the beginning of the pandemic... which not surprisingly has been highlighted by conservative social media. See the following: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/jacinda-ardern-truth/ Context "Context was missing from a video of these remarks that was reshared in July 2022. One day after tweeting the video, The Daily Wire issued a second tweet to correct that the remarks were more than two years old. Further, the video that was shared on social media did not include around 27 seconds that preceded the clip, in which Ardern spoke more about not being fooled by potentially misleading information on social media in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic."

One difference for sure, other than the high price of the former Embassy route: You used to be able to get the certificate on the same day you applied at the U.S. Embassy... as opposed to waiting a week or two for Immigration to send it in the mail. Also, at least in the past, at least some officers at BKK CW and other Immigration offices used to charge a couple hundred baht unofficial fee for residency certificates and not provide any receipt for the service... so something that was supposed to be free often wasn't free... Although, it's been some years since I applied for one there, so not sure what their practice about that is lately. Also, another possible is last time I was at BKK CW last fall, the IO and supervisor told me there that henceforth they'd be requiring updated bank book photocopies (not a new bank letter) anytime anyone on a retirement extension came mid-cycle for any service from the L section. Is it the L section that also handles residency certifs?

post vaccination -- "a rate that is approximately five times lower than after SARS-CoV-2 infection." " Also worth keeping in mind... COVID is still causing 300+ deaths per day and 3,000+ new COVID hospitalizations per day in the U.S. And here in Thailand, according to the government, one COVID death per day and 17 new COVID hospitalizations per day... Any COVID vaccination related hospitalizations and deaths, if any, pale in comparison. Thailand: "Following the weekly number of COVID-19 infected people. Between 5th - 11th March 2023 Patients treating in hospital (weekly) Number 122 people: Daily average. Number 17 people/day. Deaths ( weekly ) Number of 6 people: Daily average. Number of 1 person/day. --------------------- Total of 4,385 patients treated in the hospital (since 1 January 2566) Total death toll 255 (since 1 January 2566)" United States: "New Hospital Admissions The current 7-day daily average for February 22–28, 2023, was 3,318." Deaths The current 7-day average of new deaths (327) decreased 3.3% compared with the previous 7-day average (338)." https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/covid-data/covidview/index.html People in the U.S. who have received the new bivalent vaccine have almost a 10 times lower risk of dying from COVID compared to the unvaccinated. https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#rates-by-vaccine-status Getting vaccinated is clearly your best odds for staying safe and protecting your health.

And more from the findings of the same study: "In summary, POTS-related diagnoses appear to be acquired with increased frequency after, compared to before, COVID-19 vaccination, particularly when compared to more commonly diagnosed conditions, but at a rate that is approximately five times lower than after SARS-CoV-2 infection. "

No credible scientific evidence has been produced thus far that show it DOES work for COVID prophalaxsis. You don't take or approve medications in the absence of facts that show they work. You take or approve medications once you have facts that show they DO work for the intended purpose. https://www.factcheck.org/2022/09/scicheck-clinical-trials-show-ivermectin-does-not-benefit-covid-19-patients-contrary-to-social-media-claims/

The full article claims...they were using the radioactive materials to check for otherwise invisible cracks in steam lines... At least, that's their story, and they're sticking to it.

FATCA filing thresholds: People living in the US have lower filing thresholds: Unmarried taxpayers living in the US: The total value of your specified foreign financial assets is more than $50,000 on the last day of the tax year or more than $75,000 at any time during the tax year Married taxpayers filing a joint income tax return and living in the US: The total value of your specified foreign financial assets is more than $100,000 on the last day of the tax year or more than $150,000 at any time during the tax year People living abroad have higher filing thresholds, ranging between $200K and $600K: You are filing a return other than a joint return and the total value of your specified foreign assets is more than $200,000 on the last day of the tax year or more than $300,000 at any time during the year; or You are filing a joint return and the value of your specified foreign asset is more than $400,000 on the last day of the tax year or more than $600,000 at any time during the year. https://www.irs.gov/businesses/corporations/do-i-need-to-file-form-8938-statement-of-specified-foreign-financial-assets

FBAR has a lower reporting threshold, so probably captures more expats.. Whereas FATCA has a series of several different higher reporting thresholds, depending on one's personal circumstances. FATCA's generally going to apply to fewer expats than FBAR. For expats here, just keeping 800K Thai baht in a Thai bank account for retirement extension purposes is going to put someone well above the FBAR filing threshold -- even if they had no other foreign financial holdings at all.

The FBAR filing obligation for Americans actually applies when the combined values of any/all foreign financial holdings they had during the past year exceeds $10,000 U.S. It's not a threshold of more than $10K per foreign account, but rather, anytime when the combined values of all one's foreign accounts exceed $10K. "Who Must File A U.S. person, including a citizen, resident, corporation, partnership, limited liability company, trust and estate, must file an FBAR to report: a financial interest in or signature or other authority over at least one financial account located outside the United States if the aggregate value of those foreign financial accounts exceeded $10,000 at any time during the calendar year reported." https://www.irs.gov/businesses/small-businesses-self-employed/report-of-foreign-bank-and-financial-accounts-fbar

There were a bunch of low-quality and/or biased/faulty studies done on Ivermectin in the earlier times of the pandemic... often by authors who had commercial/financial interests in promoting/selling the drug. Over time, the medical/scientific community caught up with most of those, eventually pointing out their flaws and faults.... and ultimately producing a series of legitimate, non-conflicted studies that told a consistent result. Ivermectin is NOT an effective treatment for or preventive medication against COVID. New England Journal of Medicine Editorial Time to Stop Using Ineffective Covid-19 Drugs August 18, 2022 "During the Covid-19 pandemic, some of the early treatment trials were rushed, leading to studies that were badly conducted1 or had too few patients.2 As a result, initial evidence of the efficacy of some Covid-19 treatments could not be replicated,3,4 but these drugs were already in widespread use by then, and some clinicians have been reluctant to change to proven efficacious alternatives. Ivermectin and fluvoxamine, in particular, are still widely prescribed, even though evidence has been steadily accumulating to indicate that both treatments at acceptable doses are not effective for Covid-19." https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMe2209017

The real data says NO to that: As of December in the U.S., people who had received COVID vaccine bivalent boosters had a 9.8 times lower risk of dying from COVID than the unvaccinated. https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#rates-by-vaccine-status

Those estimates were in the early days of the pandemic, and they were only estimates.... But what came after from the WHO told the clearer tale: https://www.who.int/data/stories/global-excess-deaths-associated-with-covid-19-january-2020-december-2021 Also, in reality, small fatality percentages turn out to be very large number of COVID deaths, as illustrated by the following info from Johns Hopkins: Mexico - 4.5% case fatality rate -- 333,188 official COVID deaths Russia - 1.8% case fatality rate -- 388,478 official COVID deaths US - 1.1% case fatality rate -- 1.1 million official COVID deaths. UK - 0.9% case fatality rate -- 220,000+ official COVID deaths Thailand - 0.7% case fatality rate -- 33,900+ official COVID deaths And I caveated each of those countries' death totals as "official deaths" because the above stats are not counting the "excess mortality" data for each, which reflects how "official" COVID deaths often were a large undercount to actual COVID deaths. https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/data/mortality

I wore my N95 masks, consistently got vaccinated as recommended, and I never got COVID all these years, afaik.... Those approaches, along with social distancing, have been working just fine for me! A good mask only protects you when you actually wear it... Not if you take it off when you visit the pub... not if you don't wear it when out with friends, etc etc. They're not foolproof, but they help reduce the risk... and reduce it a whole lot more than your apparent wish of everyone roaming around spreading their germs with no precautions whatsoever.

You're misrepresenting what the article actually says to fit your own narrative... The evidence is clear, the primary route for COVID infections is thru the respiratory system (not eyes or surfaces), and masks can be effective to varying degrees in reducing those risks.

None of which says anything about the risk or likelihood of acquiring a COVID infection via ones eyes, or about the effectiveness of face masks -- which supposedly what was being discussed here lately. Read the AARP article posted prior, which actually addresses the issues at hand.

Yes... the truth is coming out, despite uninformed posts like yours. "According to the latest study from the MRC Centre for Global Infectious Illness Analysis at Imperial College London, international vaccination programs prevented 14.4 million fatalities from Covid-19 between December 8, 2020, and December 8, 2021. In Thailand, immunization initiatives saved around 382,600 lives over that period. A research team from Mahidol University and Naresuan University led by Associate Professor Dr. Charin Modchang expanded the study and utilized the same mathematical modeling approaches to estimate the number of lives saved due to Thailand’s vaccine rollout. The study revealed that between the time the first vaccine was administered in 2021 and July 3, 2022, 490,000 lives were saved."

Can You Catch the Coronavirus Through Your Eyes? Experts say it's not a big concern, but there are ways to lower your risk ... "For the most part, however, health experts believe we're probably more likely to become infected via our nose and mouth, than through our eyes, in part, says Tuli, “because our nose and mouth provide a direct passageway to the lungs,” whereas infectious particles that enter through our eyes have to take a more roundabout route. Also, notes James Cherry, M.D., a distinguished research professor and infectious disease expert at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, our tears contain antibodies that can help detect and latch onto unfriendly antigens, such as bacteria and viruses, and destroy them." https://www.aarp.org/health/conditions-treatments/info-2020/catching-coronavirus-through-your-eyes.html

And as usual, you have/present absolutely no credible source to support your claims.

Self-inflicted... Self-inflicted... Self-inflicted.... Beginning to sense a pattern there.

Sadly, there's still a country-full of Trump-inspired Jacob Chansleys out there.... From the OP report re death threats against Fauci and his family: "Fauci has long dismissed the attacks against him and shrugged Musk’s comment off — though he’s underscored that the rhetoric has sparked death threats and impacted his family. “Every time somebody gets up and spouts some nonsense that’s misinformation, disinformation and outright lies, somebody somewhere decides they want to do harm to me and/or my family,” Fauci said on CNN." That's your reward for dedicated public service in America these days....

Hey, it's not like Dr. Fauci led an attempted insurrection against his own country or anything, promoted useless and potentially harmful COVID treatments, falsely claimed early in the pandemic that it would all be over in a couple months, etc etc... I know who ought to be prosecuted here, and it's certainly not Dr. Fauci.