Can you enter Thailand if you recently had Covid?

[The Hammer2021]

5 minutes ago, Sheryl said:

There is at present no viable alternative test to identify presence of live viral material.

 

 

But it identifies dead material  as live without differentiating between the two leading to innacurate diagnosis? Astonishing. No wonder people don't 'follow the science'. Thanks for your explanation which I find frightening.

[Sheryl]

1 minute ago, The Hammer2021 said:

But it identifies dead material  as live without differentiating between the two leading to innacurate diagnosis? Astonishing. No wonder people don't 'follow the science'. Thanks for your explanation which I find frightening.

It does not identify dead material as live.

 

It makes no determination as to  whether the viral material is dead or alive. It can't.

[scorecard]

14 hours ago, Sheryl said:

For international travelers they are still requiring hospitalization. Possible that if someone has a permanent home here, they could negotiate to quarantine at home (assuming asymptomatic).

And, not surprising, at least photographic proof that your name is on the Tabien Baan book for the house, and you have a separate bedroom with bath attached, and the house has the kitchen etc., facilities to provide appropriate meals etc.

 

This is from a telephone discussion with the Thai Consulate in Sydney Australia.

 

They also mentioned that a ministry person may want to:

 

- Visit the residence and assess whether it's suitable, and/or

- Interview the most senior Thai person living at the residence to be convinced that the regulations, what is allowed/not allowed at the residence during the isolation period. 

 

 

[The Hammer2021]

7 minutes ago, Sheryl said:

It does not identify dead material as live.

 

It makes no determination as to  whether the viral material is dead or alive. It can't.

Ah sorry perhaps I am confused. It does not differentiate between live and dead material so medical  authorities just assume it is live and represents a medical threat when it does not if anything it represents healing, recovery  and possible  immunity?

[cheapcanuck]

Quarantine for you.

[Sheryl]

2 hours ago, The Hammer2021 said:

Ah sorry perhaps I am confused. It does not differentiate between live and dead material so medical  authorities just assume it is live and represents a medical threat when it does not if anything it represents healing, recovery  and possible  immunity?

 

It in no way represents "healing, recovery  and possible  immunity"

 

It means that you have viral material in your system, no more and no less. Either you have a current infection, or you have left over viral fragments from a prior infection.

 

Nothing at all to do with immunity.

 

And yes, since there is no ready way to test for the difference between live and dead viral fragments (and people with prior infections can get re-infected) Thai authorities treat a positive PCR as indicative of infection. They prefer to err on the side of caution and consider it better to isolate someone unnecessarily than to risk having an infected person in the community.

 

 

[Sheryl]

P.S. There have now been recent reports of tourists in tourist areas (Phuket, Koh Chang, Pattaya) being allowed to quarantine in quarantine hotels if COVID+ and asymptomatic.

 

Still far from fun and less likely to be covered by insurance than a hospital (though possibly some Thai-issued policies would cover).

 

 

[The Hammer2021]

15 minutes ago, Sheryl said:

 

It in no way represents "healing, recovery  and possible  immunity"

 

It means that you have viral material in your system, no more and no less. Either you have a current infection, or you have left over viral fragments from a prior infection.

 

Nothing at all to do with immunity.

 

And yes, since there is no ready way to test for the difference between live and dead viral fragments (and people with prior infections can get re-infected) Thai authorities treat a positive PCR as indicative of infection. They prefer to err on the side of caution and consider it better to isolate someone unnecessarily than to risk having an infected person in the community.

 

 

Thank you for your clarification

[The Hammer2021]

13 minutes ago, Sheryl said:

P.S. There have now been recent reports of tourists in tourist areas (Phuket, Koh Chang, Pattaya) being allowed to quarantine in quarantine hotels if COVID+ and asymptomatic.

 

Still far from fun and less likely to be covered by insurance than a hospital (though possibly some Thai-issued policies would cover).

 

 

On the issue of the bed size  alone a hotel  is preferred, plus rest and food.

[Westie1]

On 1/11/2022 at 8:38 AM, BritTim said:

With quarantine on arrival, it is possible in principle. You need to be very careful about finding an airline that will carry you unvaccinated, and not using a transfer location that blocks the unvaccinated.

 

Frankly, if you wish to engage in foreign travel, the difficulty of doing so when unvaccinated is an additional reason (over and above health and protecting others) to be vaccinated.

 

I would also warn those who do not like protecting themselves against Covid-19 that you will need to use face masks when in Thailand. 

I have been travelling around Europe for work, since the start of covid.

I am not vaxxed and only had to provide a negative pcr or antigen (depending on the country I am going to). 

what airlines are refusing unvaxxed people? I was hoping to travel to thailand in april (Doing ASQ)

Edited January 12, 2022 by Westie1

[BritTim]

4 hours ago, The Hammer2021 said:

Thank you for the clarification but it's surprising that such an unreliable  procedure would be used.  Imagine if TB or HIV were misdiagnosed in such a way.

In the case of both TB and HIV, you have the same problem. To take an example, if using modern HIV medications, usually, none of the available tests (even extremely sophisticated ones) can detect the remaining very low levels of the virus remaining in your system. However, it is known to be extremely unlikely that the virus has been eliminated, and active infection returns if antiviral treatments are withdrawn.

 

As you imply, it is worrying that there is no 100% reliable test for SARS-CoV-2, although many of the tests are very good. Research continues, and we must hope the scientists can solve the problem.

[BritTim]

4 hours ago, The Hammer2021 said:

But it identifies dead material  as live without differentiating between the two leading to innacurate diagnosis? Astonishing. No wonder people don't 'follow the science'. Thanks for your explanation which I find frightening.

With very sophisticated testing, it is possible to assign the probability of a true positive versus false positive caused by dead viral fragments. In an earlier PM I cited two links that report on attempts to do just that (based, for instance, on cycle thresholds and the number and type of markers detected). Current practical procedures take a very conservative approach that just treats any marker found as a positive, even if with sophisticated analysis it would be regarded as almost certainly a false positive.

 

Note that such analysis is not useless. When authorities are assessing the importance of contact tracing after suspected entry of the virus into a new area, looking at the probabilities in combination with the subject's travel history and known prior infections, can inform the authorities on whether to invest major resources on follow up.

[The Hammer2021]

12 minutes ago, BritTim said:

In the case of both TB and HIV, you have the same problem. To take an example, if using modern HIV medications, usually, none of the available tests (even extremely sophisticated ones) can detect the remaining very low levels of the virus remaining in your system. However, it is known to be extremely unlikely that the virus has been eliminated, and active infection returns if antiviral treatments are withdrawn.

 

As you imply, it is worrying that there is no 100% reliable test for SARS-CoV-2, although many of the tests are very good. Research continues, and we must hope the scientists can solve the problem.

Science  has been incentivised to produce status  and wealth via innacuracies. If thalidomide hadn't produced hideous visual damage but invisible  long-term  damage it would  still be prescribed. Thus the lie of PCR TESTS  promotes the Covid-19  bandwagon..

[BritTim]

9 minutes ago, The Hammer2021 said:

Science  has been incentivised to produce status  and wealth via innacuracies. If thalidomide hadn't produced hideous visual damage but invisible  long-term  damage it would  still be prescribed. Thus the lie of PCR TESTS  promotes the Covid-19  bandwagon..

I am not going to defend big pharma. Some of their actions (including Pfizer's manipulated of data from SARS-CoV-2 vaccine clinical trials) are outrageous.

 

That said, I am not in sympathy with much of the thrust of your post. Covid-19 is real. Development of fairly effective and safe vaccines for SARS-CoV-2 has been faster than most considered possible. Some effective treatments have been developed: initially monoclonal antibody (sadly, all except one ineffective against Omicron) and more recently antivirals.

 

PCR tests are not a lie. PCR is one of the greatest advances in medical diagnosis of the last 100 years. It remains true that medical diagnosis is not an exact science. It would be great to have a Star Trek style full body scanner that would automatically tell you which disease(s) someone was suffering from. Unfortunately, that remains science fiction.

 

For what it is worth, the most reliable detection of Covid-19 that is known might well be sniffer dogs. Some research has been done that shows suitably trained dogs as amazing in their ability to pick up active Covid-19 infections earlier than any tests. It is an impractical approach in practice.