Put safety before money - academic warns about opening country too quickly to "infected" foreigners

[tribalfusion001]

4 minutes ago, Don Mega said:

How can one consider people not tested into an official figure ?

That's how they work it out, mild symptoms don't need tests at present. You need to test everyone for antibodies for the true mortality rate or use an estimate that 80% are not tested.

[Don Mega]

5 minutes ago, GAZZPA said:

You cannot.. The death rate is a moving figure,, the more you test the lower it goes. Right now we don't know what the correct rate is, but indications are 1%. I guess we will all know in good time,, think we should thank our lucky stars it is that low and that the virus was not ebola... 

 

3 minutes ago, tribalfusion001 said:

That's how they work it out, mild symptoms don't need tests at present. You need to test everyone for antibodies for the true mortality rate or use an estimate that 80% are not tested.

So those harping on about "the real figures including those not tested" are basically wasting their breath then.

[DrTuner]

He's right. And they will open the borders as soon as they can to let their Northern Masters back in, to get handsome backhanders from the Chinese operated tourist businesses. Prepare for impact.

[Anton9]

I will be happy when I will se those chinese buses around, it means we are back to normality and this madness will be over.

[Pattaya46]

2 minutes ago, DrTuner said:

He's right. And they will open the borders as soon as they can to let their Northern Masters back in, to get handsome backhanders from the Chinese operated tourist businesses. Prepare for impact.

Same impact as in February and March? Nearly zero ?...

[DrTuner]

8 hours ago, darksidedog said:

Really? What are those signs exactly? The numbers outside immigration quarantine are holding steady at zero.

While I agree that opening the floodgates without any checks is likely to bring imported cases, it would be nice to see such comments supported by fact, rather than unsubstantiated rubbish.

It's all about the access to the data. Chula's hospital is one of the ones doing testing. You may have noticed the doc from Siriraj was doing the same warning, they also test. Next up somebody from Mahidol could open up, a third lab doing mass tests.

 

They know.

[Silent Number]

7 hours ago, pmarlin said:

The guy has a point to a degree but some how the headline cane across as racist in my opinion.

How is it racist.Anyone from another country coming to Thailand is Foreign and somewhat of a risk of further infection coming with them. 

[DrTuner]

6 minutes ago, Pattaya46 said:

Same impact as in February and March? Nearly zero ?...

Same as November-February, more likely.

 

 

 

However this time Northern China seems to be getting G614 through it's northern border. Probably spread through Russia.

Edited May 29, 2020 by DrTuner

[Silent Number]

7 hours ago, pmarlin said:

The guy has a point to a degree but some how the headline cane across as racist in my opinion.

How is it racist.Anyone from another country coming to Thailand is Foreign and somewhat of a risk of further infection coming with them. 

[TheRealRobin]

"The academics said...." red flag number 1!

 

There seems to be a lot of evidence that suggest that most people in affected cities fall in one of the following categories. 1) Had it, were a-symptomatic and recovered 2) Had it, felt sick for a week or two and recovered and most likely immune now or 3) Got infected, had some underlying condition and did not survive.

 

I think most countries over-reacted and focused on the wrong stuff. Resources should be directed to quarantining the weak and elderly, and educate the larger population about preventative measures. Humans for the most part are able to fight off viruses like this. Getting people scared causes exactly what we want to prevent, namely everyone with a cough running to a hospital, and in the process over-burden the health system and get exposed to people that are really infected. 

 

Now that theres a lot of data available, the virus seems to be not that much worse than the flu, and certainly much less dangerous than many of the things we do as part of our daily lives. It would be interesting to know how many people died as a result of the measures we took to stop the spread.

 

 

Edited May 29, 2020 by TheRealRobin

[Harry Fingerling]

8 hours ago, ezzra said:

I wonder if foreigners money also "infected"? without tourism money this country will go back to be what it used to be 100 years ago, poor and backward country, it is a shame that in thees days and age we still have to listen to this kind of racist garbage...

How is it racist? The guy states the probability of opening too soon could cause a second wave. Seemingly under control now based on current figures, opening the country to the much infected Europe and Americas puts all the good work at risk and potentially more unemployment than the 10 million now. Get a grip pal.

[lesmac]

Yes I agree but give the people who live here a life back

[SupermarineS6B]

7 hours ago, Chivas said:

Its a tough choice. Make no mistake Thailand has done superbly over containing Covid unlike my own hapless government in the UK which have acted with catastrophic results.

I suspect the borders will open later this year but with really onerous restrictions in place first that will put off 95% of regular visitors.

 

I cant praise Thailand enough personally for the superb job they have done in controlling Covid overall

They've been lucky with the weather...........Britain wasn't so.......   The big game changer in this region now is Hong Kong......You won't be worrying about a virus if the CCP kicks the b-Jesus out of the people there.....  China has a lot to answer for..... and they won't....... 

[Nigel Garvie]

5 hours ago, amdy2206 said:

At least we are now 'foreigners' and not 'aliens - from outer space -'.

David Ike would dispute that!!

[TheRealRobin]

Thailand would off-course probably open to China first as they are seen as the tourism injection that the country needs. Problem is, China's data is not what one would call "kosher" ????

[hioctane]

The 0.47% is a good indicator of the actual, worldwide (current) infection rate. Most, if not all, these people are coming back from countries under quarantine to some degree.  What will this mean for international travel though? 0.47% of millions of international travelers is atill quite a bit.  How would they stop these new cases? Mandatory 14 day quarantine? Mandatory testing on arrival? Mandatory tracking? 

[digger70]

9 hours ago, webfact said:

Put safety before money - academic warns about opening country too quickly to "infected" foreigners

Nah, leave that for the Returning Thais Who are coming back home from High Risk countries. ????

[Patts]

36 minutes ago, Anton9 said:

More than half the deaths in Europe are in cares homes and average age of deaths is around 80 years old(which is the average age of deaths anyway).

Why people who are at low to no risk should live their life in fear?

If you spend time to research you will see that the mortality rate is also high from the age of 45 onwards. There have been many people who have died who been perfectly healthy and aged between 20 to 40 so while you maybe happy to risk your life others are not. Many people who do survive Covid19 are left with serious life changing complications, very commonly; renal failure, damaged lungs, heart and cognitive issues etc etc. 

[Salerno]

7 minutes ago, hioctane said:

How would they stop these new cases? Mandatory 14 day quarantine? Mandatory testing on arrival? Mandatory tracking?

All of the above for the short- to mid-term.

[Nigel Garvie]

2 minutes ago, digger70 said:

Nah, leave that for the Returning Thais Who are coming back home from High Risk countries. ????

Trouble is US and UK are two of the most high risk countries (Along with Brazil and Russia) in the world right now. The virus is not choosy who your parents are/were. 

One thing that links all these countries is that they all have flag waving, nationalist, populists, in charge, and have all proved to be utterly useless at containing the virus. Strange coincidence that. 

[Traubert]

9 hours ago, Cali farong said:

Yeah keep it locked down until it’s total economic free fall.

Then guess who will be there to help,  the ones who started 

this pandemic.

Good lads. ????????

 

Cant wait.

[Don Mega]

22 minutes ago, lesmac said:

Yes I agree but give the people who live here a life back

Those that "live" here on visa exempt entries ?

[Anton9]

19 minutes ago, Patts said:

If you spend time to research you will see that the mortality rate is also high from the age of 45 onwards. There have been many people who have died who been perfectly healthy and aged between 20 to 40 so while you maybe happy to risk your life others are not. Many people who do survive Covid19 are left with serious life changing complications, very commonly; renal failure, damaged lungs, heart and cognitive issues etc etc. 

Show me the statistics of all those healthy people between 20 and 40 who died of Covid. 

You won't because those cases are very very rare.

The death rate start to be significant for those over 65 years old with multiple comorbidities.

People who are that scared should just stay home and let others live their lives.

Edited May 29, 2020 by Anton9

[rocksniffer]

Covid19 is in this world, joining a very long list of viruses https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_virus_species  It is never going to disappear. So if no vaccine found, will Thailand stay in lock down forever ? 

[BernieOnTour]

4 hours ago, bluweyze said:

360,000 Dead worlwide and it is not finished. 6.2 % of people getting the virus die. In the elderly (and the obese) the percentage is higher. It's just Chinese flu!

Thank you for proofing @Canuck1966 is right ! 

360,000 dead worldwide is exactly 0.0046% of the world population of 7.8 billion (which leaves 420,000 for your „not finished“ to reach his 0.01 % dieing).

 

And just taking the John Hopkins or WorlOmeter numbers and dividing deaths by infected cases, assuming the death rate is 6.2%, is just ridiculous - it neglects the darkfield of infected cases, which were never tested and had no or only minor symptoms.

In the meantime there have been enough studies, which proof: the death rate is in the range of 0.3 to 0.6 % and at least 80% of those infected have no or only minor symptoms.

 

 

[Elkski]

well my state, Utah went from code red to orange so now  restaurants are opening.  so many people in the park. groups  much larger than 10, no masks  hardly anywhere.   Costco food store must wear asks but many masks  wearers store the cheap surgical masks  in jean pockets.  Utah had its highest #cases of 215 yesterday but the officials still declare they see a plateau.    I'm a mountain  climber and it's called a false summit.  I hope  it to m as my false summits . 

all you naysayers a out the deadliness of this virus need to put your denial in your obit. 

 

I still dont understand how Thailand has so low numbers.  it defies logic! but so do many things in Thailand.   

maybe it's the heat? diet, som tom, peppers, or some prior respiratory immunity in Thailand?  but if even 500,000 tourists a month  start coming I feel Thailand will suffer.  

if you think this lockdown was overblown,  just imagine what a 2nd one would be like. surely longer.  

where are all the news reports of people dying of malnutrition?  yes the easy money from tourists is  gone. at least for now.  so  the government should  revamp things amd focus on real problems such  as flooding, drug  use,   China about to stop the mekong river. 

my thoughts on the Mekong is top 1% ate buying up cheap dry farmland  planning on running major pipelines  that will allow farming of past dry land.   just look at water history around the world.  conagra is on it's way.  rich get richer. 

All you naysayers need to volunteer to greet the tourists at the airport.  

[Jack Cook]

Thailand will take many years to recover from the effects of this. It's too late now even if they opened everything up tomorrow and that doesn'r take into account the companies that are packing up and leaving. Not a lot of sunshine for the forseeable future.

 

[richard_smith237]

9 hours ago, webfact said:

Dr Thira, a lecturer at Chulalongkorn University, said there were already signs that easing of the pandemic restrictions could see a rise in cases. 

Of course there will be a rise in cases with easing of lock-down.

The idea of lock-down was not to overwhelm the health services, not to eradicate the virus completely which is an impossibility.

Thus, living with an acceptable number of cases, as we do with Influenza should be the priority.

 

This article has an element of 'blame foreigners' for any increase in numbers.

 

I agreed with the world wide lock-down initially has we had no idea how devistating this 'new' virus would be, it was called the 'Novel Coronavirus' after all, because it was so new and we knew nothing about it.

Now we know what the Virus does, who it impacts and more importantly we have a better handle on the Case Fatality Rates it would now make sense to move forwards and live with a known risk, as we do with every other disease.

 

Thailand's readiness to blame foreigners for anything is always so juvenile but also so very xenophobic.

 

 

[Patts]

16 minutes ago, Nigel Garvie said:

Trouble is US and UK are two of the most high risk countries (Along with Brazil and Russia) in the world right now. The virus is not choosy who your parents are/were. 

One thing that links all these countries is that they all have flag waving, nationalist, populists, in charge, and have all proved to be utterly useless at containing the virus. Strange coincidence that. 

As most countries implemented virus control measures that were just as strict as any other country what would you have done that would have lead to a wildly better outcome?

[BernieOnTour]

1 minute ago, richard_smith237 said:

Of course there will be a rise in cases with easing of lock-down.

The idea of lock-down was not to overwhelm the health services, not to eradicate the virus completely which is an impossibility.

Thus, living with an acceptable number of cases, as we do with Influenza should be the priority.

 

This article has an element of 'blame foreigners' for any increase in numbers.

 

I agreed with the world wide lock-down initially has we had no idea how devistating this 'new' virus would be, it was called the 'Novel Coronavirus' after all, because it was so new and we knew nothing about it.

Now we know what the Virus does, who it impacts and more importantly we have a better handle on the Case Fatality Rates it would now make sense to move forwards and live with a known risk, as we do with every other disease.

 

Thailand's readiness to blame foreigners for anything is always so juvenile but also so very xenophobic.

 

 

Well he is not totally wrong 555 :

 

Something, that never happened throughout the country was to do representative or even full coverage PCR-Tests, by 2 reasons: 1) cost, 2) capacity for PCR-Tests

 

The new cases are all Thais, returning from abroad... With health certificates and no or neglectible symptoms. However: upon arrival, they are monitored and tested.

 

New tourists would also mean: More people with a higher degree of awareness and having the necessary funds to pay expensive, private PCR-tests, when feeling unwell.

 

... and then, your „Amazing Trusted Thailand“ with no new cases goes down the river ! 555