I think that the poster above has it right.

 

Thaksin introduced affordable medical care for the poor in Thailand, and ever since then the elites have been trying to get rid of it.

 

It is that simple.

6 hours ago, halloween said:

Why should public servants be denied health care services as part of their remuneration package? If the service provided isn't superior to that available to the public, what is the point of it?

I think you have answered your own question.

3 hours ago, simoh1490 said:

I disagree, Eric likes to call foul on the defence budget at every opportunity but in fact, it remains at less than 2% of GDP, lower than other regional countries and lower than international guidelines set for such things. If the government wanted to make budget cuts there are other areas they could do it successfully, without appearing to compromise on defence.

And look at the need for a strong army. Thailand has moved its army against its people so many times it is easy to see why it is a necessity. What other country has military barracks in downtown areas? The Thai military is a national political tool. Now as much as ever.

They just got 9 billion baht feom the luxury import tax.. aome of that monwy can go into the system for the elderly.

 

But the upper echelon will not have that.

3 hours ago, Samui Bodoh said:

Utopia?

 

This is generally known as Universal Health Care. I believe that you are British (apologies if I am mistaken) and so you know it as the NHS. It is common in many countries, and more and more are looking at how to do it for their populace(s).

 

Respectfully, you seem to be arguing that public servants should have better health care than the public they serve. This is nonsense to me. 

 

Public policy always works better when the administrators and/or implementer have the same benefits as the people they serve- they have every incentive to make the system work. It isn't rocket science. 

BS. Free government healthcare has always been (a very expensive) basic service. Employers, including governments, offer a raised level of healthcare as part of their salary packages, or private citizens can pay for private health cover at their own expense. the difference doesn't necessarily come as level of service, but definitely affects waiting time for non-urgent treatment.

I am not British, but I have heard of Harley St specialists, and I have a good idea who they service.

1 hour ago, Samui Bodoh said:

I think that the poster above has it right.

 

Thaksin introduced affordable medical care for the poor in Thailand, and ever since then the elites have been trying to get rid of it.

 

It is that simple.

Yeah right. And re-introduced the co-payment, removed by the Democrats as it proved to cost more to collect.

1 hour ago, halloween said:

BS. Free government healthcare has always been (a very expensive) basic service. Employers, including governments, offer a raised level of healthcare as part of their salary packages, or private citizens can pay for private health cover at their own expense. the difference doesn't necessarily come as level of service, but definitely affects waiting time for non-urgent treatment.

I am not British, but I have heard of Harley St specialists, and I have a good idea who they service.

"Free government health care"?

 

I never said it was free. No one said that it was free. The usual term is 'universal health care' which means that the cost is pooled among all citizens. The only people who call it "free government health care" are people like you who don't like it, for whatever reason.

 

"Employers... [can] offer a raised level of health care to their employees..."; no one said otherwise.

 

"Governments... [can] offer a raised level of health care to their employees". Again, no one said otherwise, although if it occurred in a country with universal care, I think there would be one hell of an outcry.

 

"Private citizens can pay for private health cover...". Again, no one said otherwise.

 

Forgive me, but I fail to see the point of your post.

 

I suspect that your inability to find a way to blame this (whatever 'this' is) on Thaksin and/or Yingluck is causing you to gnaw on your own innards. As this is a health care thread, can I suggest some ginger tea to calm your poor tummy?

 

Cheers

 

PS Apologies for getting your nationality wrong.

 

Edited January 3, 20188 yr by Samui Bodoh

4 hours ago, simoh1490 said:

I disagree, Eric likes to call foul on the defence budget at every opportunity but in fact, it remains at less than 2% of GDP, lower than other regional countries and lower than international guidelines set for such things. If the government wanted to make budget cuts there are other areas they could do it successfully, without appearing to compromise on defence.

For the vast majority of countries that 2 per cent has to fund salaries and pensions for their servicemen, and pay for training and exercises - both very expensive. Here they pay the majority of their servicemen (conscripts) very little, and don't conduct any large scale training. No one really knows what happens to the money in the defence budget, but it is not unreasonable to suggest a significant  proportion could be reallocated to health care without particularly diminishing the martial effectiveness of the armed forces.

 

Mind you it might affect the morale of the higher ranks ...

 

5 hours ago, simoh1490 said:

I disagree, Eric likes to call foul on the defence budget at every opportunity but in fact, it remains at less than 2% of GDP, lower than other regional countries and lower than international guidelines set for such things. If the government wanted to make budget cuts there are other areas they could do it successfully, without appearing to compromise on defence.

Hmmmmm....

 

https://prachatai.com/english/node/5608

 

http://zway2go.com/thailand-army-corruption/

 

Then of course there is this...

 

 

The election is going to be a landslide....Prayut knows it.

                                       

1 hour ago, Samui Bodoh said:

"Free government health care"?

 

I never said it was free. No one said that it was free. The usual term is 'universal health care' which means that the cost is pooled among all citizens. The only people who call it "free government health care" are people like you who don't like it, for whatever reason.

 

"Employers... [can] offer a raised level of health care to their employees..."; no one said otherwise.

 

"Governments... [can] offer a raised level of health care to their employees". Again, no one said otherwise, although if it occurred in a country with universal care, I think there would be one hell of an outcry.

 

"Private citizens can pay for private health cover...". Again, no one said otherwise.

 

Forgive me, but I fail to see the point of your post.

 

I suspect that your inability to find a way to blame this (whatever 'this' is) on Thaksin and/or Yingluck is causing you to gnaw on your own innards. As this is a health care thread, can I suggest some ginger tea to calm your poor tummy?

 

Cheers

 

PS Apologies for getting your nationality wrong.

 

Australia has universal health care. Government employees can have private health care paid as part of the package, which gives them more benefits than Medicare coverage - there is no outcry from those who rely on Medicare.

 

And the only person to drag Thaksin into the argument was you, ignoring his insistence on co-payment.

1 hour ago, pornprong said:

Hmmmmm....

 

https://prachatai.com/english/node/5608

 

http://zway2go.com/thailand-army-corruption/

 

Then of course there is this...

 

 

The election is going to be a landslide....Prayut knows it.

                                       

 

Let's not forget that the Civil Servant Medical Benefit Scheme includes all Civil Servants which is around 3 million people and I believe doesn't include the armed forces. The two main incentives for joining the civil service in Thailand are job security and benefits, pay is definitely not considered an attractive benefit!

 

I'm going to ignore your link to zway2go since that's a blog and nothing more than another persons opinion.

15 minutes ago, simoh1490 said:

 

Let's not forget that the Civil Servant Medical Benefit Scheme includes all Civil Servants which is around 3 million people and I believe doesn't include the armed forces. The two main incentives for joining the civil service in Thailand are job security and benefits, pay is definitely not considered an attractive benefit!

And the core supporter base for the continued overthrowing of democracy ........ entrenched civil servants.

And their pay off.... job for life and elevated levels of government subsidies over the masses.

 

Quote

I'm going to ignore your link to zway2go since that's a blog and nothing more than another persons opinion.

Facts are facts, regardless of where or by whom they are quoted.

 

E.g.

Did the military budget rise by 33.8% after the 2006 coup or not?

Did the military spend 350 million baht on the "sky dragon"or not?

Did the military spend millions on G2000 bomb detectors or not?

 

Perhaps you need to do a little research on the difference between facts and opinions.

 

And the Prachatai link???

Edited January 3, 20188 yr by pornprong

3 minutes ago, pornprong said:

And the core supporter base for the continued overthrowing of democracy ........ entrenched civil servants.

And their pay off.... job for life and elevated levels of government subsidies over the masses.

 

Facts are facts, regardless of where or by whom they are quoted.

 

E.g.

Did the military budget rise by 33.8% after the 2006 coup or not?

Did the military spend 350 million baht on the "sky dragon"or not?

Did the military spend millions on G2000 bomb detectors or not?

 

Perhaps you need to do a little research on the difference between facts and opinions.

 

And the Prachatai link???

I don't know and I don't care, I especially don't care about links to blogs and anything less than highly regarded independent source of information.

 

All I know is that today, the military budget in Thailand is less than 2% of GDP and that is pretty much a global standard, Thailand's neighbour's military budgets are often much higher, what they chose to spend their budget ion is their business,  ergo, where's the beef!

9 minutes ago, simoh1490 said:

I don't know and I don't care, I especially don't care about links to blogs and anything less than highly regarded independent source of information.

Hahaha

Clearly, what you don't care for is any source that publicises facts that you dislike or run counter to your inner prejudices.

 

Quote

All I know is that today, the military budget in Thailand is less than 2% of GDP and that is pretty much a global standard, Thailand's neighbour's military budgets are often much higher, what they chose to spend their budget ion is their business,  ergo, where's the beef!

The beef is the military budget continues to rise whilst there is an ongoing effort by unelected thugs to keep reducing the health budget.

If this were a democratic country do you think the people would be voting for the party raising the level of peacetime military spending or the party trying to improve the delivery of healthcare to all Thais?

 

From the Prachatai link:

 

The index points out that the Thai military’s procurement on average sees an increase of 30-40 per cent over normal market prices during the procurement process, where certain middlemen benefit through unregulated competition.

 

Wouldn't this 30-40 percent be better spent on hospitals, doctors, nurses and subsidising medicines???

Or is this not "beef" in your book?

 

 

 

Edited January 3, 20188 yr by pornprong

30 minutes ago, pornprong said:

Hahaha

Clearly, what you don't care for is any source that publicises facts that you dislike or run counter to your inner prejudices.

 

The beef is the military budget continues to rise whilst there is an ongoing effort by unelected thugs to keep reducing the health budget.

If this were a democratic country do you think the people would be voting for the party raising the level of peacetime military spending or the party trying to improve the delivery of healthcare to all Thais?

 

From the Prachatai link:

 

The index points out that the Thai military’s procurement on average sees an increase of 30-40 per cent over normal market prices during the procurement process, where certain middlemen benefit through unregulated competition.

 

Wouldn't this 30-40 percent be better spent on hospitals, doctors, nurses and subsidising medicines???

Or is this not "beef" in your book?

 

 

 

I don't know what you see and how long you've been seeing it but I've been looking at Thailand from within for the past 16 years and I can tell you, I'm very happy with the junta being in power, as are all the Thai people I know or have contact with.

 

And by virtue of those 16 years I have come to accept, as said previously, that corruption is a way of life here and if it doesn't happen to some degree somewhere, in the armed forces, I'll be struck down by a bolt of lightning before I finish this post! May I also be struck down if it doesn't happen in the very system you would like to reallocate 30%/40% of the military budget to!!! So since I can't do much about either Tha government budgets, nor corruption here I'm not going to worry about either but I remain pleased that the military appears to be budgeting the norm for what a country's military should budget for.

 

And I'm still not going to read your link, nor do I care about it or anyone else's blog, nor the sites of activists, it's not that my prejudices are inner in any way, they are very much exposed for all to see - point me at Bloomberg, WSJ, IMF, World Bank etc etc report and I'll read it, somchai however isn't going to get read. Next!

3 hours ago, pornprong said:

Hmmmmm....

 

https://prachatai.com/english/node/5608

 

http://zway2go.com/thailand-army-corruption/

 

Then of course there is this...

 

 

The election is going to be a landslide....Prayut knows it.

                                       

This is even a bigger problem. Medical expenses for civil servants are 5 times higher than expenses for the Social Security Scheme (employees) and the many in the Universal Health Care system.  It is outrageous asking for more co-payments in the Universal System.

10 hours ago, Baerboxer said:

 

Really. And when I worked in the Netherlands, for an American MNC, we had private health insurance as part of our package, for ourselves and our families.

 

Same in the UK. BUPA hospitals and medical facilities do rather well.

As mentioned, this applies to Dutch citizens.

You lived in Holland, worked in Holland, and had your family moved over to Holland, but you nor your family members were Dutch citizens.

 

So why should "the country" pay for your health coverage?

Do you expect free healthcare in Thailand as a tourist? Do you fly to Canada with a broken leg and demand a free surgery?

If you stayed longer in Holland you could probably opt for the national coverage also, although I don't know anything how this is arranged legally.

 

My point was that everybody in Holland pays a yearly amount (zorgpremie) which gives them the right to basic healthcare. For an extra payment they can extend the coverage to new glasses every year, unlimited dentist coverage, etc. The key is that everybody pays the same amount, and gets the same coverage.

 

A public servant pays the exact same as everybody else and also gets the exact same (as that was what you were asking about).

Edited January 3, 20188 yr by Bob12345

10 hours ago, pornprong said:

And the core supporter base for the continued overthrowing of democracy ........ entrenched civil servants.

Let me guess, so they could keep their medical benefits?  Nothing to do with the fact they are intelligent, educated people with a good insight into so-called Thai democracy.

4 hours ago, halloween said:

Let me guess, so they could keep their medical benefits?  Nothing to do with the fact they are intelligent, educated people with a good insight into so-called Thai democracy.

Intelligent, educated people with good insight don't keep repeating the same mistake for 85 years.

Selfish, greedy, inconsiderate a$$holes on the hand........