Department explains reasons for removing some countries from high-risk list

By THE NATION

 

Dr Walairat Chaifoo

 

The Department of Disease Control has explained the reasons for removing China, South Korea as well as Hong Kong and Macau from the list of countries with high risk of Covid-19 infection.

 

 

The announcement, signed by Public Health Minister Anutin Charnvirakul, has been published in the Royal Gazette on Friday (May 15) and will go into effect as of May 16.

 

“The criteria that we use to consider lifting the status ‘high risk of infection’ are: The territory must have less than 20 internal cases in the past 14 days, and that it must have medical and public health readiness to effectively handle the outbreak,” said Dr Walairat Chaifoo, the department’s head of epidemiology, on Friday (May 15).

 

Walairat added that China has reported less than 12 new patients per day since April 23, except on April 29 when there were 21 new cases from overseas and one local case.

 

South Korea has reported less than 14 new cases per day since April 20. However, the Itaewon cluster cases that recently emerged have raised the country’s new patients to 20-30 persons per day as a result of aggressive testing.

 

Macau has reported no new cases since April 9, while Hong Kong has reported less than 5 new cases since April 12.

 

“As for Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia, Malaysia and Indonesia, which had been previously announced as at high risk for infection, they will continue to remain under this status although some fit the criteria of having no to fewer new cases reported,” Walairat added. “This is because these countries have connecting borders with Thailand, some of which are still active, which pose a high risk of Covid-19 spreading.”

 

Source: https://www.nationthailand.com/news/30387950

 

-- © Copyright The Nation Thailand 2020-05-16

 

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And it is NOT because most tourists are from thees countries pray tell?...

If this means travellers from Hong Kong and Mainland China etc can now freely enter Thailand -- no insurance no quarantine no health certificate -- then apart from air flights, the problem remains that these places will still all quarantine travellers from Thailand when they return home. So unless there's a reciprocal agreement, don't expect many visitors at all due to this change.

They looking at passport holding .. risk. Not residence risk... <deleted> is that    thai stupidity 

So Koreans and Chinese spend more money than rich westerners.

Farangs are too cheap, it seems. 

China? Who saw that coming

2 hours ago, rooster59 said:

Walairat added that China has reported less than 12 new patients per day since April 23, except on April 29 when there were 21 new cases from overseas and one local case.

 

South Korea has reported less than 14 new cases per day since April 20. However, the Itaewon cluster cases that recently emerged have raised the country’s new patients to 20-30 persons per day as a result of aggressive testing.

 

So then in fact, neither China nor SK have yet met the actual Thai government criteria the good doctor laid out above...and yet, the govt. has now lifted their "infected status".  Why???

 

If you're not going to follow your own criteria, why have them?

 

It's all down to bhartificial intelligence and the believable superhero Xi????

In case you have yet to notice...

 

"as a result of aggressive testing" 

 

is code for:

 

"so, we don't really have to count them."

3 hours ago, taxout said:

If this means travellers from Hong Kong and Mainland China etc can now freely enter Thailand -- no insurance no quarantine no health certificate -- then apart from air flights, the problem remains that these places will still all quarantine travellers from Thailand when they return home. So unless there's a reciprocal agreement, don't expect many visitors at all due to this change.

No one is coming in until June 1 at the earliest, but more likely June 16 or even July 1 (based on airline schedule filings). I suspect a lot of changes will be announced between now and then. I doubt Thailand would tolerate any double standards as you are implying. Also, these days outbound travel from Thailand is no small thing - Hong Kong is very popular with Thais, and there are possibly more Thais traveling to Hong Kong than in the reverse direction these days. Korea is also highly popular.

I hope we'll go back to the usual status quo - no special docs required for entering but suspect that will take several weeks or months after the borders re-open, before it happens. It's totally unpredictable. What is predictable is that almost no one will be prepared to travel, unless these restrictive measures are removed. Based on a recent Forbes article I read by a freelance author on the future of air travel, if that dystopian scenario were to materialize, rest assured air travel for 90% of us will be over. Personally, I don't see that happening though - Vietnam is a good example of how things will develop. They started with social distancing on planes, but that has since been dropped. Nearly all domestic flights are back in operation as of today. As far as I am aware, there are only a small handful of travel requirements: 1) temperature check when entering airport and prior to boarding (possibly also on arrival) 2) masks must be worn during check-in, boarding, throughout the flight, de-planing and baggage claim 3) no food or drinks served on board 4) health questionnaire submitted prior to boarding 

 

Eventually some of these measures will be dropped. I give it a couple more months.

Big factor is the mighty tourist dollar. Thailand need those tourist to get that Thailand economic engine running again.

Thai logic:

Step 1- make a totally arbitrary criteria based on nothing but sounds good on paper.

Step 2- fail to follow own criteria and allow rich countries in*.

Step 3- don't allow poor countries in, despite meeting the criteria.

* - They're not allowing anyone in right now, but if it isn't obvious - this is the first step towards easing flight restrictions. No risk no ploblem!

 

Don't get me wrong - I hope Thailand opens flights as I'm stuck out of it currently, but just own up to it and say you need the tourists instead of coming out with b/s "criteria". Thailand has not had and will not have the massive spread experienced in colder climates.

3 hours ago, Chelseafan said:

China? Who saw that coming

And how about the possibility of casinos and gambling - far more lucrative than farangs flying in for sea, sand and SEX!

1 hour ago, PingRoundTheWorld said:

Thai logic:

Step 1- make a totally arbitrary criteria based on nothing but sounds good on paper.

Step 2- fail to follow own criteria and allow rich countries in*.

Step 3- don't allow poor countries in, despite meeting the criteria.

* - They're not allowing anyone in right now, but if it isn't obvious - this is the first step towards easing flight restrictions. No risk no ploblem!

 

Don't get me wrong - I hope Thailand opens flights as I'm stuck out of it currently, but just own up to it and say you need the tourists instead of coming out with b/s "criteria". Thailand has not had and will not have the massive spread experienced in colder climates.

It's all irrevelant if countries stick to 14 day quarantine when you return home. I read the report on Hong Kong, app on phone and tracking wristband. Countries that are enforcing these restrictions now are not going to relax them for months, so these tourists will not be coming. Countries that rely on tourism may need to cast their net back to the western tourists instead Chinese ones.

Why not Taiwan then ? I suppose that's a stupid question though. And New Zealand. 

This is just a plan in response to a plan Vietnam is developing to create a Travel Bubble with South Korea and China to be quickly followed by Taiwan, Aus, NZ, and Singapore. Thailand was excluded from Vietnam's proposal, go figure. It's on skift.com, if you want to read it (i'm not sure about the rules on linking).

1 hour ago, Knocker33 said:

Why not Taiwan then ? I suppose that's a stupid question though. And New Zealand. 

Taiwan was never on the list. Neither NZ

I don't understand what has 'connecting border' got to do with 'high risk'.

 

Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam all have low cases so they should be considered low risk. Some are even lower than Thailand.

Would you put the US or the UK on this list. I think Thailand can and will do as they please and not ask anyone for advice, get over it cry babies

59 minutes ago, phkauf said:

This is just a plan in response to a plan Vietnam is developing to create a Travel Bubble with South Korea and China to be quickly followed by Taiwan, Aus, NZ, and Singapore. Thailand was excluded from Vietnam's proposal, go figure. It's on skift.com, if you want to read it (i'm not sure about the rules on linking).

What is the definition of travel bubble?

8 hours ago, rooster59 said:

Walairat added that China has reported less than 12 new patients per day since April 23, except on April 29 when there were 21 new cases from overseas and one local case.

I agree with this. China has been transparent from the beginning. They told the world at the earliest possible moment there was some sort of new SARS like virus. They told the world at the earliest possible moment that this was a person to person transmission virus. They alerted the WHO to tell the world that international travel should stop immediately. They have never covered up anything and are open to investigation and have been from the beginning. They have never destroyed evidence. All figures about infections and deaths are correct. 

Brilliant. In the face of ever increasing evidence that the CCP has lied about everything these fools believe them. Not surprising, they probably believe their own figures. Thailand you let them in to start with to get it all going why not again. Absolutelty no second wave stuff happening in China. AHHHHHHHHHHHHH! MORONS! Something tells me Prayut's mate Xi Jinping's been on the phone.

Safe, unsafe, Chinese aren't going to be allowed to come anyways.  

Spin the headline any way you want to give hope, it's obvious that tourism is obliterated for all of 2020.  

A post using an unsubstantiated death total and the replies have been removed.

 

A post using a trolling reference of a public person's name has been removed. 

37 minutes ago, EricTh said:

I don't understand what has 'connecting border' got to do with 'high risk'.

 

Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam all have low cases so they should be considered low risk. Some are even lower than Thailand.

I guess it's because they know low testing = low cases.

2 hours ago, Knocker33 said:

Why not Taiwan then ? I suppose that's a stupid question though. And New Zealand. 

Stop asking sensible questions!

 

..... and what about Vietnam too?

Govts will do as they please. We have no say whatsoever. Our safety is not the focus here it’s political expediency plus economics plus holding the reigns of power, and keeping them tightly held.

were all gunna die sometime why not in the next outbreak or whatever ya wanna call it of Covid 19?

 

 

2 hours ago, tribalfusion001 said:

It's all irrevelant if countries stick to 14 day quarantine when you return home. I read the report on Hong Kong, app on phone and tracking wristband. Countries that are enforcing these restrictions now are not going to relax them for months, so these tourists will not be coming. Countries that rely on tourism may need to cast their net back to the western tourists instead Chinese ones.

The trend will be to travel bubbles where no 14 quarantine is required on either end. This is the first step of the asian version of the travel bubble. Thailand can get access to a third of their tourists with these countries alone so this is not unexpected. 

1 hour ago, EricTh said:

What is the definition of travel bubble?

From what I understand, it allows people from the included countries to travel within the bubble and not be subject to quarantines. Australia and NZ are working on it as well. 

I think initially it's intended for business folks to revive trade, but tourism is definitely a factor in the article. Vietnam is looking to replace Thailand as a favored destination. Although the Vietnamese people absolutely hate the Chinese, so that will be interesting.

1 hour ago, Berti said:

Taiwan was never on the list. Neither NZ

do you have link for the full list as I cannot find one

4 hours ago, PingRoundTheWorld said:

But just own up to it and say you need the tourists instead of coming out with b/s "criteria".

Yeah right