Opening up Thailand to tourists a "potential catastrophe", wait six months urges Chula doctor

[Mises]

I am from the UK.

Does anyone anywhere know anyone who actually died of COVID? Of not with.  One guy at my work knows someone that died but they were at death’s door anyway and that is the total extent of my experience.  My daughter was working as flight crew abroad but gave up and returned to Thailand, she has 3 more days of quarantine in a hotel, she is not allowed out of the room at all and all food is delivered to outside the door.  14 days of that would send anyone crazy even without their carreer being destroyed.  Yesterday a man doing the same in her hotel threw himself off the balcony.  So I now know of more suicides than COVID caused deaths.  I suspect I am not alone.  And that is before all the extra cancer and heart disease deaths that are now a certainty in the UK

[Swimfan]

1 hour ago, Guderian said:

When the annual flu season is just kicking-off in the countries that provide most of Thailand's tourists, it's probably not the best time to start opening the borders. The shops, hotels and bars might get a decent month or so of business, but as the virus starts spreading out of control the authorities will have no choice but to impose a lockdown again. The lockdown will seriously hurt most businesses, not just those in the tourism sector. So what do you do, give the tourism industry a brief respite at possibly enormous and unnecessary cost to the non-foreign tourist sector, which makes up 85% of Thailand's GDP remember? That doesn't make any sense to me, why would you risk inflicting great damage on the largest part of your economy just to try and boost a relatively small part of it?

Sound like Spain. Desperation for the tourist dollars. Now they are heading into Autumn and Winter with a large spike in cases they probably wont be able to control.

[Spellforce]

5 minutes ago, Swimfan said:

There is usually a lag of about 4 weeks after infection rates spike for the death rate to start to increase

No that's only 14 days, look at the graph above about France:

- peak of the "daily new cases" = 31 th march

- peak of "daily new deaths" = 15 th april

 

That's also why the quarantines lasts 14 days.

[Saint Nick]

13 minutes ago, Mises said:

I am from the UK.

Does anyone anywhere know anyone who actually died of COVID? Of not with.  One guy at my work knows someone that died but they were at death’s door anyway and that is the total extent of my experience.  My daughter was working as flight crew abroad but gave up and returned to Thailand, she has 3 more days of quarantine in a hotel, she is not allowed out of the room at all and all food is delivered to outside the door.  14 days of that would send anyone crazy even without their carreer being destroyed.  Yesterday a man doing the same in her hotel threw himself off the balcony.  So I now know of more suicides than COVID caused deaths.  I suspect I am not alone.  And that is before all the extra cancer and heart disease deaths that are now a certainty in the UK

Do you know anyone, who died of starvation?

No?

Neither do I!

Still millions are dying of starvation, every year!

Not seeing something personally and then not believing it is not the most intelligent way to go about things!

[Naturesway]

This is the problem with the so called doctors where ppl trust them like they were god while they only memorized more words from the textbook in the school which are already written down in the book and available to read to anyone, and throw op those textbook words again front of the exam judges makes u entitled to be a doctor who will heal the population. This is one of the basic problem with the world 

[AndresSP]

5 minutes ago, Mises said:

I am from the UK.

Does anyone anywhere know anyone who actually died of COVID? Of not with.  One guy at my work knows someone that died but they were at death’s door anyway and that is the total extent of my experience.  My daughter was working as flight crew abroad but gave up and returned to Thailand, she has 3 more days of quarantine in a hotel, she is not allowed out of the room at all and all food is delivered to outside the door.  14 days of that would send anyone crazy even without their carreer being destroyed.  Yesterday a man doing the same in her hotel threw himself off the balcony.  So I now know of more suicides than COVID caused deaths.  I suspect I am not alone.  And that is before all the extra cancer and heart disease deaths that are now a certainty in the UK

I know of one person now fighting severe pneumonia with the actual virus long gone. He is well over 70 with an underlying condition. 

[steelepulse]

28 minutes ago, Swimfan said:

There is usually a lag of about 4 weeks after infection rates spike for the death rate to start to increase. in case you haven't noticed after all this time.its not like people just drop like flies after infection, but usually after a sustained attempt to keep people alive in hospital.

You are aware that the big increase is cases is due to the huge increase in testing correct?  Most of the people that are shown as positive have no symptoms whatsover.  You are aware of this correct...... in case you haven't noticed.

[CapeTown]

4 hours ago, Oldie said:

Time to look for N95 masks again as long as they are available. 

The virus is a 100 times smaller than an average bacteria. The N95 mask looks like deep space to it.

[Dukeleto]

40 minutes ago, Mises said:

I am from the UK.

Does anyone anywhere know anyone who actually died of COVID? Of not with.  One guy at my work knows someone that died but they were at death’s door anyway and that is the total extent of my experience.  My daughter was working as flight crew abroad but gave up and returned to Thailand, she has 3 more days of quarantine in a hotel, she is not allowed out of the room at all and all food is delivered to outside the door.  14 days of that would send anyone crazy even without their carreer being destroyed.  Yesterday a man doing the same in her hotel threw himself off the balcony.  So I now know of more suicides than COVID caused deaths.  I suspect I am not alone.  And that is before all the extra cancer and heart disease deaths that are now a certainty in the UK

The same for me with the exception that no one I know has died or even been Knowingly infected. Mind you when you look at the amount of human beings in the world and the number of confirmed COVID-19 infections the odds appear slim.

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

1 hour ago, Paiman said:

 

To be honest, I am getting sick of the scaremongering.  They have to learn to live with it, so many are asymptomatic and the fallout for the healthy people is in my opinion outweighing the virus.

 

Now I most likely get a few unhappy people with the following statement, but if some people die, so be it. 

 

 

 

Are you volunteering to be a coronavirus martyr for the Thai economy?   After all, if you die, so be it!!!

[Oldie]

19 minutes ago, CapeTown said:

The virus is a 100 times smaller than an average bacteria. The N95 mask looks like deep space to it.

I know - the most helpful would be to stop breathing completely. But the N95 masks are still more helpful than most other masks that you can buy here. And the virus often travels in small droplets and these the mask will block.

 

Edited August 28, 2020 by Oldie

[Swimfan]

24 minutes ago, steelepulse said:

You are aware that the big increase is cases is due to the huge increase in testing correct?  Most of the people that are shown as positive have no symptoms whatsover.  You are aware of this correct...... in case you haven't noticed.

And what drives the increase in testing ?

[ThailandRyan]

2 hours ago, Nice Boyd said:

AGreed , Do what Bali is doing 

What are they doing besides shutting down completely as of now.  Do you have any new info.

Latest as of yesterday was closed until 2021

https://www.independent.co.uk/travel/news-and-advice/bali-closed-coronavirus-foreign-tourists-2021-indonesia-september-a9687021.html?ocid=uxbndlbing

[rtco]

5 hours ago, webfact said:

Opening up Thailand to tourists a "potential catastrophe"

Should read "NOT opening Thailand to tourists a "potential catastrophe"

[connda]

So says another rich doctor who will never need to worry about being out of a job and unemployed and losing his business, his life savings, and everything he's worked for during his lifetime. 

"Shut everything down until next year prime minister.  People like you and I aren't going to be effected.  Let the commoners eat rice and bugs.  We don't need no stinkin' foreign tourists." 

[DrTuner]

1 hour ago, Swimfan said:

There is usually a lag of about 4 weeks after infection rates spike for the death rate to start to increase. in case you haven't noticed after all this time.its not like people just drop like flies after infection, but usually after a sustained attempt to keep people alive in hospital.

But, the ICUs aren't full either. Most seems to be mild infections. And of course the testing is now on a completely other scale than it was in March. It's not the same as it was.

[DrTuner]

11 minutes ago, Swimfan said:

And what drives the increase in testing ?

Availability of testing equipment and reagents. Supply and capacity has been greatly increased (not so in Thailand, still at ~5k/d AFAIK).

[Mises]

37 minutes ago, Saint Nick said:

Do you know anyone, who died of starvation?

No?

Neither do I!

Still millions are dying of starvation, every year!

Not seeing something personally and then not believing it is not the most intelligent way to go about things!

Has anyone starved to death in the developed world (or Thailand?) lately? So, no, I don't know anyone who starved to death.  I fail to see the relevance of this. And you doubt my intelligence.

 

And before some other smartrs gives examples of people who died of Anorexia, yes I did know a wife of a friend of mine who died basically of voluntary starvation.  Following which my frind drank himself to death.  Very very sad but again irrelevent.

[agood1963]

5 hours ago, webfact said:

Dr Thira Woratanarat, head of Chulalongkorn University hospital's medical faculty, said that the country should wait six months to avoid a potential catastrophe. 

The economic death of the land of smiles.

 

[Swimfan]

2 minutes ago, DrTuner said:

Availability of testing equipment and reagents. Supply and capacity has been greatly increased (not so in Thailand, still at ~5k/d AFAIK).

So when they get more equipment and reagents etc more people come out to get tested ?

[sahibji]

it is best not to rush the opening up of the country to tourists; it should be done in calibrated stages.

[from the home of CC]

 'potential disaster' is underplaying it imo, I believe it would be a 'guaranteed disaster'. Good on the Thai professionals, they certainly are  intellectually outperforming their western counterparts..

[DeepSea]

4 hours ago, Dumbastheycome said:

It need be acknowledged that there is an inevitable lag time for recorded fatalities from an increase in infection rates. No doubt there will those  who will insist that these two graphs "prove" the risk level has been exaggerated  as  opposed to the  reality  only  time  will tell !

 

And yet the correlation between the March and May sections of each graph suggests not so much... Or did you conveniently overlook that?

[Skallywag]

I am still waiting for a Government Health official to shut down all roads to personal vehicles.  People need to use public transportation or walk.  Simple, healthy, money saving, and good for the air and the economy as well. 

Why such a concern over a virus when you willingly accept 23,000 deaths every year from automobile accidents?   

I just read the Philippines shut down because of 3,000 Covid deaths, yet their annual seasonal flu death rate in 75,000 every year?  How does that make sense?  

[sahibji]

2 minutes ago, agood1963 said:

The economic death of the land of smiles.

 

better to be safe than sorry. many countries that opened up to tourists too soon are regretting. the second wave has brought woes.

[spiekerjozef]

Make it 9 just to be sure...

[mike787]

Thailand will NOT be open to tourists until late 2021 or 2022.  End of story. 

[DrTuner]

11 minutes ago, Swimfan said:

So when they get more equipment and reagents etc more people come out to get tested ?

There's been a queue in most places. In Thailand they stopped publishing the numbers of pending tests when it was evident they could do only a few per day. Even in Finland, where the situation is pretty good, the supply can barely cope with demand. In many places still you can't get tested at all.

 

One of the likely reasons doctors are trying to stop the invasion is that they know Thailand's testing capacity won't be able to take it. "Too expensive", better buy a few submarines.

Edited August 28, 2020 by DrTuner

[Destiny1990]

They finally have walking street all for themselves and so why Its dead now?

[Pedrogaz]

Yes Dr Thira you are correct? The question is not how coronavirus is doing in Thailand, but how is it doing in the places the tourists come from. Europe is still a disaster, US is a total disaster, and I wouldn't trust India, China or Nation America: all of theses places will have lots of Covid positive travellers. We don't need these people to come to clean Thailand and spread their filthy disease.