Grim forecast of coronavirus infections refuted by senior health official

[snoop1130]

Grim forecast of coronavirus infections refuted by senior health official

 

 

A senior doctor at Thailand’s Disease Control Department (DCD), has dismissed as “very unlikely” the grim forecast by some doctors that by April 15th COVID-19 infections in Thailand will reach 350,000, with about 7,000 fatalities.

 

DCD Deputy Director-General Dr. Thanarak Phlipat said on Facebook today that he has received many enquiries about whether forecasts of an exponential rise in the number of infections and fatalities is reasonable.

 

He responded by saying it is “very unlikely.”

 

With less than 20 days to go before April 15th, Dr. Thanarak said that the predictions of 7,000 fatalities for Thailand, in the case of no lockdowns, and 485, if a lockdown is imposed, are inflated.

 

Thailand’s death toll up to March 29th stood at 7, out of the 1,388 confirmed COVID-19 infections.

 

He said that he does not know what assumptions were used in those forecasts and doubted the forecasters’ expertise in epidemiology and biological statistics, adding “most importantly, I don’t know what their motive is for releasing those figures.”

 

He explained that the Public Health Ministry has epidemiologists to develop forecasts, and those forecasts are updated periodically, based on the latest data. These forecasts are used in the planning for dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic, he said.

 

According to Dr. Thanarak, the worst case scenario, up to April 15th, is that there would be 25,000 infections if there are no anti-COVID measures taken at all and there are no more cluster infections, like at the boxing event and at entertainment venues.

 

With the imposition of social distancing measures, which is currently being observed by only about 50% of the Thai population, he said that the number of infections is predicted to reach 17,600, but 7,700 if 80% of the population were to follow the measure.

 

These figures, said Dr. Thanarak, were worked out on the basis of the best data available used to guide the formulation of policy, adding that they were not invented to cause public confusion.

 

He advised that any predictions about the pandemic must be based on undistorted facts.

 

Source: https://www.thaipbsworld.com/grim-forecast-of-coronavirus-infections-refuted-by-senior-health-official/

 

-- © Copyright Thai PBS 2020-03-30

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[smedly]

9 minutes ago, snoop1130 said:

the grim forecast by some doctors that by April 15th COVID-19 infections in Thailand will reach 350,000, with about 7,000 fatalities.

well they won't reach those numbers unless you test for them otherwise people just died of ........................... something and got something

 

the right question to ask this so called "senior health minister" is - how many tests for CV-19 have actually been done in Thailand ???????????????

 

UK are doing 10,000 per day soon to increase to 25,000 - the rest of the west are also testing huge numbers along with Japan S'Korea Malaysia and Singapore 

 

WHAT ABOUT THAILAND ???????????? the self claimed Medical Hub of South East Asia - How many tests have you done ???????????????

[bluesofa]

54 minutes ago, snoop1130 said:

A senior doctor at Thailand’s Disease Control Department (DCD), has dismissed as “very unlikely” the grim forecast by some doctors that by April 15th COVID-19 infections in Thailand will reach 350,000, with about 7,000 fatalities

Thank dog he's not a government minister. We all know if he was, the figures would be confirmed in two days.

[eeworldwide]

My concern is if we don't have a realistic and honest/transparent view of the true number of infections in Thailand, then the place will become a death trap for months on end, because those in power are not doing the proper thing in working on managing this virus. Burying ones head in the sand in terms of this pandemic will NOT have a good end result.

https://www.smh.com.au/world/asia/human-rights-clamp-down-across-south-east-asia-as-coronavirus-spreads-20200330-p54f7t.html

[DrTuner]

Would be nice if they'd share their estimates of the R0 and other variables so we could pop them into the SEIR model ourselves: http://gabgoh.github.io/COVID/index.html

[DrTuner]

3 hours ago, smedly said:

WHAT ABOUT THAILAND ???????????? the self claimed Medical Hub of South East Asia - How many tests have you done ???????????????

This might shed some light on that question: 

 

[ParkerN]

5 hours ago, snoop1130 said:

Thailand’s death toll up to March 29th stood at 7, out of the 1,388 confirmed COVID-19 infections.

 

 

Highly likely, I don't think.

 

 

[ben2talk]

That's good news for Bangkok Hospital - 25,000 for Covid19 test there. I'll bet there's a very long queue. For the clever people who invested heavily in these hospitals it's a golden age.

 

It's not easy to gauge - some cultural habits can go a long way to modify virus behaviour, and Thai's aren't heavily into physical contact, so it's quite hard to compare to other countries really.

 

Just stay home and wait and see... It takes a few weeks for any issues to appear - people recently jumped on busses, so we can wait another month to see if there's an exponential rise in that figure - or perhaps limited testing will keep the numbers low until the death rate starts to peak.

 

The biggest concern, as always, is actually one of economics. Life is cheap and many companies are gagging their staff. My wife wouldn't post to Facebook or share news outside her family even if there were any - we can't afford it.

[TheDutchEngineer]

4 hours ago, smedly said:

well they won't reach those numbers unless you test for them otherwise people just died of ........................... something and got something

 

the right question to ask this so called "senior health minister" is - how many tests for CV-19 have actually been done in Thailand ???????????????

 

UK are doing 10,000 per day soon to increase to 25,000 - the rest of the west are also testing huge numbers along with Japan S'Korea Malaysia and Singapore 

 

WHAT ABOUT THAILAND ???????????? the self claimed Medical Hub of South East Asia - How many tests have you done ???????????????

Thailand has done 17,829 tests. Phillippines only 3303. Have a look on wikipedia COVID-19 testing. 

[marko kok prong]

If the Thai people do as advised,i see no reason,especially with the hottest month to come,that they can avoid this scenario,problem is they are not taking it seriously,markets still open,monk ceremoneys going on, people walking around no masks but hey eat more chilli,you be good.

[smedly]

3 hours ago, TheDutchEngineer said:

Thailand has done 17,829 tests. Phillippines only 3303. Have a look on wikipedia COVID-19 testing. 

wikipedia ?

 

I could have written that myself - I want official figures as they are important to provide a complete picture of what is going on in this country

[maxsugars]

If we didn't have the internet and 24 hour news there would have been a brief uptick in hospital admissions and deaths and then that would have been it. Like the Donald boldy stated the cure will tuen out to be worse than the disease. When it's time to go then it's time to go. 

[webfact]

topic runs here:

 

 

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