TallGuyJohninBKK

There's a place in the pandemics world for both vaccine and therapeutic medications. But I agree with the sentiment expressed above: In general, as the cited doctor recounts, it's better to prevent people from getting sick in the first place vs. trying to treat them after they've become sick. That said, vaccines are not 100% effective in preventing illness, and therapeutics likewise (at least the two main ones for COVID, paxlovid and molnupiravir) also have been shown to have only partial effectiveness when used as recommended, and need to be taken very soon after an infection (timeliness of starting treatment has been an issue) to be effective. As the OP report above recounts: "The development of Covid-19 therapeutics was slow, and the drugs that eventually emerged were not highly effective. A study published in Nature Communications found that nine days after starting a course of Molnupiravir, 48% of patients had cleared the virus, compared to 56% who did not take antivirals." So clearly, it's not an either-or proposition, but one of the medical world needing to deploy everything in its arsenal to first try to prevent people from getting sick in the first place, and then being able to effectively treat people who nonetheless end up getting sick despite vaccination or because of failing to get vaccinated or keep up-to-date with them.

COVID-19 lab leak theory "The COVID-19 lab leak theory, or lab leak hypothesis, is the idea that SARS-CoV-2, the virus that caused the COVID-19 pandemic, came from a laboratory. This claim is highly controversial; most scientists believe the virus spilled into human populations through natural zoonosis (transfer directly from an infected non-human animal), similar to the SARS-CoV-1 and MERS-CoV outbreaks, and consistent with other pandemics in human history.[1] Available evidence suggests that the SARS-CoV-2 virus was originally harbored by bats, and spread to humans from infected wild animals, functioning as an intermediate host, at the Huanan Seafood Market in Wuhan, Hubei, China, in December 2019.[5][6] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_lab_leak_theory If anyone reads thru the long entry linked above, they'll find repeated references to the phrase "conspiracy theory/ies" and "conspiratorial thinking."

IMHO, this is what happens, as is the case here, where the Thai cabinet approves policies "in principle." Meaning the actual nuts and bolts details are left to others to sort out... and uncertainty reigns in the meantime. Per the headline of their announcement: The Cabinet meeting resolved to approve in principle the implementation of measures and guidelines for visa facilitation to stimulate the economy and tourism of Thailand in all 3 phases.

The feds funded a grant. There's no proof thus far that the grant or the work done under the grant had anything to do with the outbreak of COVID. Per the New York Times, May 1: A heated hearing produced no new evidence that Peter Daszak or his nonprofit, EcoHealth Alliance, were implicated in the Covid outbreak. ... "But in a report and in extensive questioning on Wednesday, the Republicans offered no new information suggesting that EcoHealth Alliance or Dr. Daszak were involved in the coronavirus outbreak. And they did not produce any evidence pointing directly to a coronavirus leak from a lab in China, with or without EcoHealth’s involvement, a hitch in their yearslong effort to implicate Chinese and American scientists in the beginnings of the pandemic. ... The subcommittee, which is led by Republicans, has reviewed nearly a half-million pages of documents and conducted over 100 hours of private interviews in the course of investigating the origin of Covid, Representative Raul Ruiz of California, the panel’s top Democrat, said on Wednesday. But, Mr. Ruiz said, the subcommittee has found “no evidence” linking the pandemic to EcoHealth’s research. And he added that the investigation had not “meaningfully advanced our understanding of the pandemic’s origins.” https://archive.ph/Ho5gO#selection-7113.0-7117.219

"That push has so far yielded no evidence that American scientists or health officials had anything to do with the coronavirus outbreak." https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/28/health/nih-officials-foia-hidden-emails-covid.html

This appears to be the Thai language original version of the announcement on all these various changes: https://www.thaigov.go.th/news/contents/details/83599 And the Google Translate English version of it... https://www-thaigov-go-th.translate.goog/news/contents/details/83599?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en I don't see any clarifications on the 180 days issue in the Google Translate rendering of this.

Siam Legal appears to have an interpretation of the DTV visa that says is it NOT a cumulative 180-days permission over the life of the visa... but rather, 180 days per year... which would be more consistent with the traditional notion of multiple entry visas.... The all-new Destination Thailand Visa for remote workers in Thailand "The recent announcement introduced the “Destination Thailand Visa” (DTV), which will be valid for 5 years and allow holders to stay in Thailand for a total of 180 days each year [emphasis added]. These days need not be consecutive, and the 180-day limit means that holders will not have their foreign income taxed by Thailand. Further details on the new visa are sparse, as it was recently announced, but more information should be announced by June 1. At the time of this writing, what is known about the visa includes: The visa is valid for 5 years, but holders can only stay in Thailand for 180 days per year. Applicants must be at least 20 years old, and prove they have at least 500,000 THB in the bank to support their stay. Holders cannot apply for a work permit but can earn untaxed foreign income while in Thailand. The visa fee is planned to be 10,000 THB. https://siam-legal.com/travel-to-thailand/new-thai-visas-and-sweeping-changes-to-immigration-rules-announced/ FWIW, I'm reading the BKK Post report on all the various recent visa change announcements, and it only refers to the DTV giving a 180-day stay permission, but no reference to whether that's cumulative under the visa or a per year reference.

The image does appear to have originated with the MFA... I'm finding one version of it on the Thai Embassy New Delhi website, but with no further explanation/clarification there: https://newdelhi.thaiembassy.org/en/content/new-thailand-s-visa-measures?cate=614489badd57933bb40edbf2 Thailand's New Visa Measures วันที่นำเข้าข้อมูล 29 May 2024 วันที่ปรับปรุงข้อมูล 29 May 2024 | 291 view On 28 May 2024, the Cabinet approved the new visa measures for promoting tourism sector and boosting the economy, namely: 1. Visa Exemption (60 days) for 93 countries/territories 2. Visa on arrival (VoA) for 31 countries/territories 3. The Destination Thailand Visa (DTV) Note: the effective date will be announced upon the completion of final procedures.

Every day here continues to be an unrelenting adventure.... 😞

If true, that would be a very strange and impractical type of 5-year visa.... All I know is, the graphic posted at the top of this thread refers to the 5-year visa as being "multiple entry," which normally means repeat entries are allowed, with each receiving the specified number of days allowed (180 in this case)... The scenario you're describing from the other Thai media reports would be more like a single-entry visa with one in-country extension allowed. But yikes! who knows.....

The Thai tax provision isn't keyed to how long one's permission to stay or visa term is, but rather, how long you physically stay in Thailand during a given year... And, you're not taking into account the ability under this new visa of doing a 180-day additional in-country extension at Immigration.

I agree the descriptions above are somewhat confusing / vague... Here's the non-authoritative way I understood what was posted.... --It's a multiple entry visa valid for 5 years. --Each entry/stay in Thailand allowed up to 180 days. --For each entry into Thailand, a one-time in-country extension of up to 180 days is allowed... (I understood the one-time in-country extension reference to be per entry, not cumulative for the life of the visa....) Meaning, if I'm translating the above correctly, that a person holding the visa would still have to physically leave Thailand at least once per year during the term of the visa, and then re-enter to start the new 180+180 days process over again....

In "taxy" terms, this topic is like the gift that keeps giving and giving and giving....

So you are referring to this post of yours in that thread? AND And I'm assuming the language and document cites you're referring to there is to one of the "guide" documents you've been keeping on the Thai taxation topic?

If I'm reading this topic correctly, it's about VISA categories... not about extension of stay categories.

Jim, from all the early stuff saw on the newish Thai tax provisions, I thought those pretty clearly spelled out an exemption for imported funds given as a gift/gifts to Thai spouses, up to a pretty large limit. Did something change on that somewhere along the way? BTW, correct me if I'm wrong... but from the U.S. end of things, if I have accrued savings in a U.S. account and decide to gift a portion of that to my Thai spouse, I've already paid U.S. income tax on that income when it was earned. And, the U.S., in its own taxation scheme, has a pretty high threshold before it gets to taxing gifts, including a gift tax exemption for gifts to spouses? Are there types of gifts that are not taxable? Yes. There are a few categories that, in general, are not subject to gift taxes, including: Tuition paid directly to a college Medical bills paid directly to a care provider Gifts to your spouse Gifts to political organizations https://www.britannica.com/money/gift-tax-rules https://www.investopedia.com/terms/u/unlimited-marital-deduction.asp

When I go to that website, all I see are the various posted questions, but clicking them doesn't appear to show any of the actual answers???

Your comment above regarding the speculation about Thai tax compliance potentially being linked at some point to the visa/extension process... The above speculation also doesn't reflect the fact, as previously noted here, that not ALL resident expats will in fact have a legal obligation to file a Thai tax return...or even register for a Thai tax ID. Because their foreign incomes sources may be exempt / non-assessible under the various tax rules (such as exempt by double taxation treaty provisions and/or being pre-Jan.1 savings accrued abroad, etc.)

Health Officials Tried to Evade Public Records Laws, Lawmakers Say May 28, 2024 House Republicans on Tuesday accused officials at the National Institutes of Health of orchestrating “a conspiracy at the highest levels” of the agency to hide public records related to the origins of the Covid pandemic. And the lawmakers promised to expand an investigation that has turned up emails in which senior health officials talked openly about trying to evade federal records laws. The latest accusations — coming days before a House panel publicly questions Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, a former top N.I.H. official — represent one front of an intensifying push by lawmakers to link American research groups and the country’s premier medical research agency with the beginnings of the Covid pandemic. That push has so far yielded no evidence that American scientists or health officials had anything to do with the coronavirus outbreak. But the House panel, the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic, has released a series of private emails that suggest at least some N.I.H. officials deleted messages and tried to skirt public records laws in the face of scrutiny over the pandemic. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/28/health/nih-officials-foia-hidden-emails-covid.html

... ... https://oversight.house.gov/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/Daszak-Testimony.pdf

House panel takes Fauci adviser to task for allegedly evading public records laws 23 May 2024 ... "A congressional panel yesterday grilled a top scientific adviser to former National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) Director Anthony Fauci about email exchanges the witness had with his longtime friend Peter Daszak, EcoHealth’s embattled president. Both Democrats and Republicans on the panel suggested the adviser tried to evade public records laws and offered inappropriate help to the EcoHealth leader. ... Morens is now on administrative leave after it became public that he used personal email accounts to correspond with Daszak, as well as other researchers, about the 2020 suspension of a controversial NIAID grant to EcoHealth and its subsequent reinstatement. ... In his testimony, Morens repeatedly apologized for his actions and said “jokes” between friends were being misinterpreted as actual misdeeds. He said he switched to a personal Gmail account to correspond with Daszak because Daszak and his family were receiving death threats. He worried that personal information in NIH emails could be publicly released, after being requested via FOIA, and increase the risks for Daszak. He dismissed a comment he made about wanting a “kickback” from EcoHealth’s reinstated grant, as well as a reference to creating a “secret back channel” to Fauci, as “black humor” among friends trying to lift Daszak’s spirits." https://www.science.org/content/article/house-panel-takes-fauci-adviser-task-allegedly-evading-public-records-laws

The credible facts and research say the info above is wrong and overblown, even allowing for changes since the dates of the reports below: How many Muslim extremists are there? Just the facts, please. Brigitte Gabriel claims the 15 to 25 percent of the world's Muslims are plotting attacks in the West. Why that number is inaccurate. January 13, 2015 ... "Not according to Angel Rabasa, who is a senior political scientist at the RAND corporation. While conducting research for a 2014 book he coauthored, "Euro Jihad," he found that Western European intelligence agencies estimated that less than one percent of the Muslim population living within their borders are at risk for becoming radicals [emphasis added]. ... Working off of these intelligence estimates, if you were to take one percent of the Muslim populations of Germany, France, and the United Kingdom, by the most liberal of estimates, less than 125,000 Muslims living in these combined countries would be prone to radicalization. Add that to the possible radical population across the rest of Europe and the sum is approximately 325,000 Muslims are at risk of becoming radical. The key qualifier is "at risk of becoming radical." That doesn't mean they will pick up a gun or start plotting an attack." https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/terrorism-security/2015/0113/How-many-Muslim-extremists-are-there-Just-the-facts-please Tracking Radical Opinions in Polls of U.S. Muslims 2017 "This Research Note examines two telephone polls (2007, 2011) and three Internet polls (2016) to track opinions of U.S. Muslims relating to the war on terrorism. Results indicate that a small but consistent minority (five to ten percent) justify suicide bombing of civilians in defense of Islam..." ... Favorable opinion of Al-Qaeda (AQ) was low in both polls (1-12% in 2007 and 0-6% in 2011). Similarly, justifying suicide bombing (SB) was low in both polls: 2-10% in 2007 and 2-9% in 2011." [with the individual numbers varying among different Muslim ethnic/national subgroups in the surveys] ... Predicting RadOpinion. In 2007 only low education was a significant predictor of RadOpinion, that is, the mean of opinion of Al-Qaeda and opinion of suicide bombing. In 2011 there were two significant predictors: low education and reporting being physically threatened or attacked because of being Muslim. The one consistent predictor, low education, is not statistically strong; we do not yet understand why a small minority of U.S. Muslims have this radical opinion." https://repository.brynmawr.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1088&context=psych_pubs

All of the things I was thinking as well, harking back to my high school and college days working in various restaurant operations. And likewise my experiences here being seated at Thai restaurants, and never having any problem about that... Sometimes we might want a table and they seat us in a booth. Or sometimes we might want a booth and they seat us at a table, depending on the sizes and configurations of the options on hand. If we don't want or like what we get from their initial seating, a bit of discussion always has led to a satisfactory resolution. I've never felt here like I/we (the Thai wife and I) were being discriminated against for any reason via the seating selection process.

I don't know the basis for the claims you're making here, or how you arrived at your 4 billion figure. The basic COVID stats are: --7 million official deaths --estimated COVID deaths direct and indirect causes totaling 3-4 times higher --lives saved/deaths avoided by the COVID vaccines in the many millions, the exact figure depending on various sources. As for COVID vaccine side effects, all the credible sources are clear that serious side effects actually caused by vaccination are very rare among the 13 some billion doses administered thus far, and that those reactions are vastly offset by the numbers of lives saved. I've never seen any single, across-the-board explanation for why those people who do have serious reactions to COVID vaccines end up having those reactions. The potential reactions are varied depending on age, many other personal details and the specific vaccine given, and I'd assume their causes would be as well. But in general, it's well established that almost any medication or medical procedure undertaken is going to have some level of risk across a broad population.

Or your math calculations are nonsense... There are and were vastly different raw numbers of COVID infections vs hospitalizations vs deaths... and different rates for how effective COVID vaccines are/were in preventing infections (some), hospitalizations (substantial) and deaths (very substantial). So it's no surprise that the greatest protective rate from vaccinations is going to be against deaths.