Must Read Thailand reports 3,052 COVID-19 cases, 24 new deaths

[anchadian]

Of the 3,052 new cases that were found in the past 24 hours: - 1,924 were found via tests at medical facilities - 482 via proactive tests at known clusters - 605 via proactive tests at prisons - 41 imported cases - 24 fatalities #WhatsHappeningInThailand #โควิด19

 

https://twitter.com/ThaiEnquirer/status/1395984821755678723

 

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

A government spokeswoman clarified Saturday that foreign nationals' legal status in Thailand will NOT be a basis for eligibility to receive COVID vaccinations.

 

“I would also like to mention a very important point – if you feel you’re not sure about legal status living in Thailand, this is not a concern to receive a vaccination," said spokeswoman Pensom Lertsithichai. "It is in all of our interests for you to get vaccinated as soon as possible to help our country achieve herd immunity. So please do get vaccinated. Don’t worry about your legal status."

 

During the daily televised English language COVID news briefing, Lertsithichai also elaborated some on the details of the upcoming vaccination program for foreign nationals.

 

“Thailand attaches utmost importance to vaccinating everyone according to their level of risk, regardless of their nationality," she said. She also asked that foreign nationals interested in vaccinations not immediately begin trying to contact the vaccination sites now, as they're just beginning to make their preparations for the June 7 start of registrations.

 

"For foreigners who are living in Thailand who are not sure if they fit into these particular [government listed] groups of foreigners, well, you can register for vaccination at hospitals where you previously have your medical history. Or, if you are living in Bangkok if you don’t have a hospital that you’ve got any medical history of having been treated at, you can visit Vimut Hospital and Bangrak Vaccination and Health Center,” Lertsithichai said.

 

“For those living in the rest of the country, they can do on-site registration at hospitals or medical centers that have been designated by the provincial governors," she added.

 

The two designated vaccination centers in Bangkok for foreign nationals -- Vimut Hospital and Bangrak Vaccination and Health Center -- will be overseen by the private Council of University Presidents of Thailand group because the group will able to assist with ensuring that those sites have sufficient English speaking staff to assist in the vaccination registration process.

 

During Saturday's news briefing, the government spokeswoman gave no indication of what kind of operating schedule the two Bangkok centers will have, nor did she clarify whether the other hospital registration sites will include all hospitals (public and private) or only government-run hospitals.

 

 

 

[TaoNow]

24 minutes ago, Bkk Brian said:

Thanks, not good news though, up it goes

 

The literal translation of the term in the charts that's being referred to to as the  'positivity rate'  is "high-risk contact cases."

 

So, presumably this means that they are checking people who had close and prolonged contact with a newly-infected person. 

 

That the trend line is upward may indicate increased infectiousness within households/worksites.

 

But it is not sentinel surveillance data. 

 

 

[Bkk Brian]

Just now, TaoNow said:

 

But it is not sentinel surveillance data. 

 

 

Quite aware of that, the very fact it says the category is for outreach testing!  

 

Thats exactly why it needs to be combined with PUI hospital walkin in cases, you can find the link to those here https://ddc.moph.go.th/viralpneumonia/situation.php positive rates for those are far higher. Although this is the Thailand wide hospital walk ins

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

Graphs below show how Thailand is faring versus world countries and its regional peer countries in terms of total COVID cases since the start of the pandemic. Thailand now ranks 90th among more than 200 countries based on total numbers of COVID cases.

 

 

 

 

https://www.facebook.com/informationcovid19/posts/330215151930149

 

 

Edited May 22, 2021 by TallGuyJohninBKK

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

Graph below shows the daily trends of Thailand's new COVID cases since the start of the current third wave outbreak at the beginning of April, with no apparent sustained trend either up or down in recent case counts, particularly if you exclude the recent addition of prison-based cases.

 

The blue sections represent self-referred cases. The yellow section cases found from outreach testing, and the gray sections are prison cases.

 

 

This graph below shows daily new COVID cases for the past week of May 16 to 22 for (in order on the three lines) new domestic cases in Thailand, new cases in Bangkok province and new prison cases. The final column to the right is total numbers of cases for each since the beginning of April:

 

--Saturday's total domestic cases tally was the fourth highest of the past seven days.

--the Bangkok province tally was the third highest of the past seven days.

--the prisons tally was the lowest figure of days with reported cases during the week.

 

 

 

https://www.facebook.com/informationcovid19/posts/330215151930149

[anchadian]

Of the 4,608 proactive tests that were conducted at six testing centers in Bangkok on May 20, 268 people have tested positive or 5.75%. The hiesgest were found at Bang Kapi Market where 137 samples out of 845 were positive or 16.21%. #โควิด19วันนี้ #WhatsHappeningInThailand

 

https://twitter.com/ThaiEnquirer/status/1395989540414783488

 

[Danderman123]

54 minutes ago, Bkk Brian said:

"Overall" positivity rate for outreach COVID testing in Bangkok of 7.04 percent.

 

To be clear, this positivity rate is not for all of Bangkok, but only for the clusters. 

 

 

[Danderman123]

4 minutes ago, anchadian said:

Of the 4,608 proactive tests that were conducted at six testing centers in Bangkok on May 20, 268 people have tested positive or 5.75%. The hiesgest were found at Bang Kapi Market where 137 samples out of 845 were positive or 16.21%. #โควิด19วันนี้ #WhatsHappeningInThailand

 

https://twitter.com/ThaiEnquirer/status/1395989540414783488

 

It looks like the testing at the 6 targeted clusters found a cold spot., with a 1% positivity rate. 

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

Vaccinations Update for Saturday:

 

 

https://www.facebook.com/KhaosodEnglish/posts/4343756678976564

 

 

 

 

[Bkk Brian]

25 minutes ago, Danderman123 said:

To be clear, this positivity rate is not for all of Bangkok, but only for the clusters. 

 

 

To be even clearer it is for all active testing that they currently are doing in Bangkok. Clusters or otherwise

[Bkk Brian]

27 minutes ago, Danderman123 said:

It looks like the testing at the 6 targeted clusters found a cold spot., with a 1% positivity rate. 

The highest?

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

3 hours ago, anchadian said:

 

So it appears that tourist and those on extended stay will have to pay for the vaccines.

 

https://twitter.com/ThaiNewsReports/status/1395948950851489795

 

 

 

It would appear that Richard Barrow's interpretation of this was contradicted today by the government spokeswoman during the daily English language news briefing... As I posted above, she said legal status in Thailand will NOT be a factor in being eligible to participate in the government's free vaccination program.

[bluedoc]

4 hours ago, realfunster said:

To be honest, I don’t have massive faith in any case metrics reported here apart from deaths. That’s the one I am watching closely - and it is holding steady, for now. I view that as mildly encouraging as we are now over 1 month since hitting 1k per day cases being ‘officially’ reported - April 14th

They are not telling the true number of deaths by Covid. There many being put down as pneumonia. Check deaths by pneumonia.

[Megasin1]

4 hours ago, realfunster said:

 

To be honest, I don’t have massive faith in any case metrics reported here apart from deaths. That’s the one I am watching closely - and it is holding steady, for now

Funny - a death only counts if you were tested positive, so the deaths reported are as limited as the testing.

[BKKBike09]

The facts are always open to interpretation. As someone in his 50s I don't want to get Covid but equally I'm not going to cocoon myself from the world indefinitely. 

 

India is dreadful but the infection rates - expressed as % of population - are still below the worst levels experienced in the UK / USA. If India has 400,000 cases a day, that's roughly 0.03% of total population. When UK had 60,000 a day, that was 0.08% of total population.

 

But when you have a population of 1.4 billion, no health system in the world can cope with even 1% of the population needing urgent hospital treatment at the same time. 

 

To continue with the UK example, which seems to be popular here, the mortality rate for those under 50 is extremely low: less than 0.01%. The people who die in much greater numbers than they would in the course of normal life are mainly over 70.

 

So yeah, if you're under 50 (in fact, even probably under 60) and relatively healthy your risk of serious illness or death is, statistically, very small.

 

 

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/covid-19-reported-sars-cov-2-deaths-in-england/covid-19-confirmed-deaths-in-england-report

 

 

 

[onthedarkside]

A number of off-topic, bickering and trolling comment posts have been removed and/or edited.

 

[Neal182]

4 hours ago, dinsdale said:

Yes some people die from this virus. Just shy of 3,500,000 people so far.

The WHO said today that the official worldwide death toll could be 6 to 8 million.

[FarFlungFalang]

1 hour ago, Danderman123 said:

It looks like the testing at the 6 targeted clusters found a cold spot., with a 1% positivity rate. 

Which is why they did the most testing there.

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

Today's recap of new COVID cases province by province. Once again, the government is reporting all the prison cases as being in the Central region, even though they're not all necessarily in prisons there.

 

437 new cases reported Saturday from Phetchaburi from the large factory outbreak there, though news reports have put the total number at close to 1,700 -- many of which may not yet have been reported yet in the national statistics.

 

TNAMCOT English

May 21

Cal-Comp Electronics (Thailand) Co., Ltd. has closed its factory in Phetchaburi for 2 weeks after 700 Covid-19 cases were found. Its worker dormitories, accommodating about 6,000 people were also closed. Free meals are provided to workers, living there.

@TNAMCOT

 

 

 

And Friday's province by province details by comparison:

 

 

https://www.facebook.com/nbtworld/posts/10158032246537050

Edited May 22, 2021 by TallGuyJohninBKK

[Cake Monster]

3 hours ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

 

 

Updated report for Bangkok with a new testing positivitity rate as of today:

 

From 7.04 % positivity to 9.08 % positivity is a huge climb upwards. Something in the region of a 25 % + increase.

Is this because of the more virulent strains of Covid, or has more testing been conducted.

Either way, it is cause for concern

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

Public health officials said Saturday they are totally sealing off a construction workers camp site in the Laksi district of Bangkok where more than 1,100 of nearly 1,700 workers have tested positive for COVID, including some with the more easily spread so-called India variant of the virus.

 

"The Bangkok Communicable Disease Control Committee has therefore imposed measures to seal off the workers camp for 28 days in order to contain this outbreak," said spokeswoman Pensom Lertsithichai during the government's televised COVID news briefing on Saturday.

 

"The affected workers will receive food supplies and other necessities and will be taken well care of with proper medical treatment, while those who have developed moderate symptoms will be sent to hospitals," Lertsithichai added, saying the same kind of isolation measures likely also will be used on other construction-related COVID cluster outbreaks.

 

The Indian variant of the coronavirus thus far has been detected in 36 of 80 samples analyzed for it from the Laksi workers camp built by developer Italian-Thai Development Co., officials said. Those infected included 21 Thai workers, 10 from Myanmar and five from Cambodia.

 

 

Edited May 22, 2021 by TallGuyJohninBKK

[ThailandRyan]

3 minutes ago, Cake Monster said:

From 7.04 % positivity to 9.08 % positivity is a huge climb upwards. Something in the region of a 25 % + increase.

Is this because of the more virulent strains of Covid, or has more testing been conducted.

Either way, it is cause for concern

Work camp clusters, factory clusters, close in proximity dorms with no social distancing, sharing from the same water cup on top of the water bucket, so many variables, but it is spreading.  The indian variant is in the Lak Si workers camp, and who knows where else it has spread....

[dinsdale]

I would really like to know testing numbers in Thailand. Worlometer had Thailand at 8,124,896 on the 13th of May. It's the same now. I have to ask why hide the number of tests being done unless it's absolutely pitiful which of course means infections are way higher than being told . Every expert on Covid says if testing is low in countries that have high numbers of covid positives the number must be higher. Maybe I'm completely wrong because as we know this government is transparent and truthful when it comes to their fantastic handling of this pandemic. 

[Petey11]

4 minutes ago, Cake Monster said:

From 7.04 % positivity to 9.08 % positivity is a huge climb upwards. Something in the region of a 25 % + increase.

Is this because of the more virulent strains of Covid, or has more testing been conducted.

Either way, it is cause for concern

If they are conducting more testing and the rate goes up I think it's even more worrying. If it was at 7% and stayed at that or decreased you'd be more confident the infection was not spreading as quick or reducing. That's the idea if mass testing, keep testing more until you get to a rate of 3% or less and you know you are getting a grip on it.

[Bkk Brian]

7 hours ago, Danderman123 said:

I would be worried if the number of hospital walk-in cases were increasing. 

 They are

 

1,924 were found via tests at medical facilities

 

By far the higher number for many days, look at the bar chart posted earlier, blue bar 

[anchadian]

All eyes on China’s Sinovac – Thailand’s vaccine choice for emergency

 

Sinovac’s COVID-19 vaccine is coming under greater public scrutiny as the Thai government procures millions more doses.

 

Thailand has already imported 6 million doses of the vaccine – also known as CoronaVac – from China, including 500,000 jabs donated by the Chinese government. Next month, Thailand will take delivery of another 3 million doses of the Chinese vaccine. Most Thais who have been vaccinated received CoronaVac, which will soon be administered to several million more.

 

As a result, the Thai public is keen to find out more about this inactivated vaccine.

 

https://www.thaipbsworld.com/all-eyes-on-chinas-sinovac-thailands-vaccine-choice-for-emergency/

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

The Ministry of Public Health on Saturday also released the following chart showing some of the outlying province clusters reported in Saturday's new cases tally:

 

[Donga]

44 minutes ago, dinsdale said:

I would really like to know testing numbers in Thailand. Worlometer had Thailand at 8,124,896 on the 13th of May. It's the same now. I have to ask why hide the number of tests being done unless it's absolutely pitiful which of course means infections are way higher than being told . Every expert on Covid says if testing is low in countries that have high numbers of covid positives the number must be higher. Maybe I'm completely wrong because as we know this government is transparent and truthful when it comes to their fantastic handling of this pandemic. 

One of the very best performers in the world. And recognised as such by WHO and John Hopkins University. I could list all the reasons why they've done well, but frankly getting tired of it. Here's a few - relatively tight border control, face masks from onset, effective contact tracing and one million health volunteers

Pity the ranking of 90 is based on total cases per date, and not per capita. If you go through the same data table you'll find Thailand would rank around 175 out of 222 countries. Not many of those lower have nearly the same exposure to travel in and out (many African countries), nor the level of migrant workers, which have become a feature of this wave.. https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries

If you're in Thailand, relax as you're in one of the safest places for Covid on the planet, but still need be careful. I get out of Bangkok quarantine on Monday, then Hua Hin ????

Edited May 22, 2021 by Donga

[anchadian]

Vaccination begins at Min Buri prison, with aim of inoculating all inmates in a week

 

By the end of Saturday, 1,500 inmates would be vaccinated while all the 3,831 inmates in the Min Buri prison would be inoculated within one week,” the department’s director-general, Ayut Sinthopphan, said.

 

“The Department of Disease Control has supplied two types of vaccines -- Sinovac for those under 60 years old, and AstraZenecca for elders and those with underlying health problems. Navamin 9 Hospital has sent medical staff to help with the vaccination.”

 

As of Saturday noon, the Department of Corrections reported 523 new infections among prison inmates, while cumulative cases under treatment are 14,348, or 4.61 per cent of the total 311,268 prisoners nationwide, while 218 prisoners have been cured

 

https://www.nationthailand.com/in-focus/40001176