How Thailand rode out COVID waves only to be hit by ‘virus tsunami’

[webfact]

 

By Thai PBS World’s General Desk

 

The latest wave of COVID-19 in Thailand has dwarfed its predecessors, with daily figures surging to nearly 10,000 new cases and almost 100 deaths. So, how did Thailand get to this point after doing so well to contain the first wave last year?

 

The sudden uncontrollable rise in infections is being blamed on several factors, including the highly-contagious Delta variant, limited supply of vaccines, trafficking of migrant workers, and ineffective control efforts. Here is how the COVID-19 crisis unfolded in Thailand since the virus first arrived last year.

 

First wave

In January 2020, Thailand became the first country outside China to confirm a case of COVID-19. The authorities responded quickly with strict measures, including months of lockdown, in a bid to bring the deadly outbreak under control. By late May 2020, not a single local transmission was detected, winning Thailand much praise for its timely and effective action.

 

Full story: https://www.thaipbsworld.com/how-thailand-rode-out-covid-waves-only-to-be-hit-by-virus-tsunami/

 

-- © Copyright Thai PBS 2021-07-14

 

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[NCC1701A]

4 minutes ago, webfact said:

blamed on several factors, including the highly-contagious Delta variant, limited supply of vaccines, trafficking of migrant workers, and ineffective control efforts. 

nothing about patients running the asylum?

[keith101]

3 minutes ago, webfact said:

So, how did Thailand get to this point after doing so well to contain the first wave last year?

Limited testing from the beginning and not importing a good vaccines (not Sinovac) is IMO the reason Thailand is up the creek along with  the backward thinking of wait and see from the PM and DPM .

[poskat]

with this and likely future waves, its time to get my surfboard out of mothballs

[Mr Meeseeks]

Complacency.

Hubris.

Incompetent leaders. 

No vaccine ordering and stockpiling as a pre-emptive measure.

Too slow to implement local vaccine production.

Over-estimation and almost total reliance on local vaccine production. 

Failure to order any vaccines from Pfizer, Moderna or J&J.

Allowing Songkran to go ahead.

Porous borders.

Government ministers frequenting sex-clubs in Bangkok then running away and lying about it.

A lack of willpower to lockdown after Songkran when it was clear numbers were on the rise.

Stupidly allocating millions of vaccines to tourist islands instead of virus epicentres in order to implement a face-saving sandbox scheme which was doomed to abject failure.

 

Any more?

[grandpa]

10 minutes ago, webfact said:

So, how did Thailand get to this point after doing so well to contain the first wave last year?

By refusing to mass test around the country and allowing people to travel from Hot spots without restriction.  Also, most countries pre-empted the situation escalating and ordered millions of vaccines as they became available rather than relying on the "Thailand old boys network" to keep it "in house"  Utter buffoons the lot of them!

Edited July 14, 2021 by grandpa

[ThailandRyan]

Tsunami, not quite, but is still building.

[utalkin2me]

How did the delta variant even get in? The borders are closed. I would love to see that actually addressed.

 

The most likely answer… the people who make the rules can travel, so they do, and brought back the delta variant. 

[law ling]

13 minutes ago, utalkin2me said:

How did the delta variant even get in? The borders are closed. I would love to see that actually addressed.

 

The most likely answer… the people who make the rules can travel, so they do, and brought back the delta variant. 

Yes, I think you've hit the nail on the head: porous land borders ... and why?

- big shots on casino tours

- Thais sneaking in to avoud quarantine

- day-traders, transport trucks being waved through

- blind eye turned to Burmese etc entering, because they are "needed" to run some industries

 

... could go on ... but it's all too late now ...

[John Drake]

1) Thonglor 2) Songkran

[Peabody]

37 minutes ago, NCC1701A said:

nothing about patients running the asylum?

"...and ineffective control efforts. "

Always watch for the buried lead

[bestie]

21 minutes ago, utalkin2me said:

How did the delta variant even get in? The borders are closed. I would love to see that actually addressed.

 

The most likely answer… the people who make the rules can travel, so they do, and brought back the delta variant. 

India - Myanmar - maybe Laos - Thailand. It isn't that far. Before it's even been detected it's spreading to other countries. And no country can control their borders 100%. 

[rott]

7 minutes ago, law ling said:

Yes, I think you've hit the nail on the head: porous land borders ... and why?

- big shots on casino tours

- Thais sneaking in to avoud quarantine

- day-traders, transport trucks being waved through

- blind eye turned to Burmese etc entering, because they are "needed" to run some industries

 

... could go on ... but it's all too late now ...

The porous borders have always been there, they did not just get that way when Delta arrived. 

[PFMills]

And there was me thinking that we kept letting the Chinese enter. Memory must be going due to old age

[BobinBKK]

I'm not sure how failing to do mass testing 15 months ago can be called "riding out COVID waves" instead of a bold face lie is beyond me... It's like testing software. If you don't test you won't find any bugs. Therefore my software is defect free? PA-LEZZZ!!!

[Surelynot]

1 hour ago, webfact said:

The sudden uncontrollable rise in infections is being blamed on several factors, including the highly-contagious Delta variant, limited supply of vaccines, trafficking of migrant workers, and ineffective control efforts. 

If only there was some kind of body or organization that had an overview of this and had the powers to take preemptive action........like a government maybe?

Edited July 14, 2021 by Surelynot

[ezzra]

 

 

Paraphrasing Andy Williams song...

Where do I begin
To tell the story of how stupid can leaders be
The sweet ignorance story that is older than the sea
The simple truth about how thing should have been
Where do I start?...

[ThailandRyan]

9 minutes ago, Surelynot said:

If only there was some kind of body or organization that had an overview of this and had the powers to take preemptive action........like a government maybe?

You mean someone who really gave a feces

[Methuselah]

"When the situation was manageable it was neglected,and now that it is thoroughly out of hand we apply too late the remedies which then might have affected a cure.

Want of foresight,unwillingness to act when action would be simple and effective,lack of clear thinking,confusion of counsel until the emergency comes,until self-preservation strikes its jarring gong--these are the features which constitute the endless repetition of history"

Churchill 1933.

[utalkin2me]

1 hour ago, law ling said:

Yes, I think you've hit the nail on the head: porous land borders ... and why?

- big shots on casino tours

- Thais sneaking in to avoud quarantine

- day-traders, transport trucks being waved through

- blind eye turned to Burmese etc entering, because they are "needed" to run some industries

 

... could go on ... but it's all too late now ...

Yes of course. Everyone suffers, but if an important shipment of Tom yam needs to make its way across the border, as you say the Burmese truckers will be allowed to take it. 
 

It’s all such a farce.

[utalkin2me]

1 hour ago, bestie said:

India - Myanmar - maybe Laos - Thailand. It isn't that far. Before it's even been detected it's spreading to other countries. And no country can control their borders 100%. 

That’s part of the point of course. If you can’t control it you may as well open the goddam border. 

[tlandtday]

Thailand's story is no testing equals no virus now testing so virus everywhere.  

[Thomas J]

2 hours ago, webfact said:

The authorities responded quickly with strict measures, including months of lockdown, in a bid to bring the deadly outbreak under control. By late May 2020, not a single local transmission was detected, winning Thailand much praise for its timely and effective action.

This reminds me of the story of the person studying flies.  He pulled the legs off the fly and slapped his hands and the fly flew away.  He then pulled the wings off the fly slapped his hands and of course the fly remained.  He concluded that pulling the legs off had no effect on the flies hearing but pulling the wings off made the fly completely deaf. 

The reality is that all of SE Asia had extremely low covid infection rates in the beginning.  I find it too hard a stretch to believe that Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, Burma and Laos all had the foresight and took the exact correct actions to stem the virus but now all are simultaneously doing the wrong things. 

SE Asia had a low rate of infection, for reasons that we may never be able to completely know.  And now it has a higher rate of infection.  Perhaps it is just SE Asia's turn in the barrel.  Not every country in Europe or state in the USA had identical experiences.  The statistics on the effectiveness of covid prevention measure are just not clear.  Two areas doing the exact same thing have markedly different results.  The one thing that all countries including Thailand could have and should have done is to order as much proven vaccine as possible, and get the population vaccinated.  The rest is just a Kabuki dance, strictly for show. 

[mtls2005]

Other than closing the borders not much was done.

 

As time moved along, the regime was content to do nothing but bloviate.

 

Evidently the hot air wasn't enough to stop the new waves.

 

Now? They're still inflating their pool toys while the tsunami bears down.

 

It's committee time.

 

 

[IamNoone88]

There is only one reason; A totally ineffective vaccine program.

[TheFishman1]

Corruption 

[sapson]

Thailand has been hit by the consequences of the idiots negligent policies for well over a year.

 

Pandemic figures were based on the most miniscule of testing which was actively discouraged by both threat of cost and obstructive ridiculous criteria, hence the absurd illusion of a virtually covid free Thailand perpetuated, which only real morons could have believed, whilst the virus spread at will until the sh@@t really has hit the fan..

[vandeventer]

5 hours ago, Mr Meeseeks said:

Complacency.

Hubris.

Incompetent leaders. 

No vaccine ordering and stockpiling as a pre-emptive measure.

Too slow to implement local vaccine production.

Over-estimation and almost total reliance on local vaccine production. 

Failure to order any vaccines from Pfizer, Moderna or J&J.

Allowing Songkran to go ahead.

Porous borders.

Government ministers frequenting sex-clubs in Bangkok then running away and lying about it.

A lack of willpower to lockdown after Songkran when it was clear numbers were on the rise.

Stupidly allocating millions of vaccines to tourist islands instead of virus epicentres in order to implement a face-saving sandbox scheme which was doomed to abject failure.

 

Any more?

The poor Government had nothing to do with the mess we are in, It's always somebody else. Just like all those great Chinese vaccines. I wonder where they came from? And it would be nice if they worked better.

[BusyB]

5 hours ago, ThailandRyan said:

Tsunami, not quite, but is still building.

And it will hit ... this stuff spreads exponentially, and in a couple of weeks time those not included in today's figures will become evident ... it tends to lag by about two weeks ...

It's a horrific prospect.

I hope very very much that I'm wrong and somehow an India situation can be avoided.

[DonaldBattles]

If the government continues to sell the output of the vaccine to neighbor countries there will never be enough to vaccine local people. I have tried to get vaccinated and I am told that until all the Thais are finished we don't have anything for farangs.  Sinovac has proven to be almost worthless but they keep buying from China. What is wrong with the good stuff from Europe and the USA?