Thai Health Ministry Campaigns For End Of Squat Toilet Use To Lessen Arthritis Risks

[brfsa2]

ARTHRITIS IS NOT CAUSED FROM SQUATTING DOWN!!!!!!!

How dumb are the advisers to the government?

Arthritis is caused by a LACK of nutrition!!!

quitting junk, heated oil, sugar, fried food, sauce, soda, fast food, batter, milk, cheese, etc.. THIS WILL STOP YOUR BODY FROM GETTING WORSE.

and then switching over to FRUIT and GREEN VEGETABLES and PLENTY OF WATER... and GOOD SLEEP. = this will Prevent and cure Arthritis.

squatting down is simply AGGRAVATING the persons condition that already exists from their lifetime of bad eating tendencies.

i'm sure this is great news for the Toilet Manufacturer companies!!

HOW ABOUT SOAP IN EVERY TOILET???

this will help prevent so much wide-spread bacteria from peoples hands.

so many toilets up and down the country dont have soap.

The government should Focus on peoples food and health and hygiene.

I WONDER IF ANYONE WHO IS BEHIND THIS NEW TOILET DECISION HAS ANY VESTED INTEREST WITH A LARGE TOILET MANUFACTURER??

- it wouldn't surprise me.

Exactly to the point!

The government cannot solve the Obesity and Arthritis real issues, so they take the cheap shortcut of the toilet thing, and as well cash-in some money from the toilet manufacturers and hospitals once Thai people start having issues from sitting toilet.

Arthritis is cause by malnutrition, obesity, overweight and most importantly: Calcium excess.

Squat toilet has been around hundreds of generations, it's the natural way for the human to defecate.

For pregnant woman, it's even recommended to do squat position to prevent disorders and back problems. It's even the natural way and preferred way to give birth without much pain.

When I see a squat toilet I see many risks and arthritis is not one of them.

For example? what do you "see" as risks? have you "got" any of them? if not, then you're hypothetical.

Oh really? A member on Thaivisa recently complained that he was fed up with people asking him what it was like in Thailand.....I advised him to tell the truth. Here's what I said......

Och you're living the fantasy life in their minds......stop being so petty minded and just tell them the truth. Thailand is a nightmare!!

Your day begins with the Imam wailing at 5.30 in the morning cos you've just found out why that hotel was so cheap on the internet, he quietens down after 5 minutes but now you can hear the effin cockerels trying to impersonate him and the Soi dogs barking at the World. You wander outside in a dazed and get harassed by annoying wee women wanting you to buy pre-packed lunch boxes for the poor Monks who stand there silently beseeching you not to buy the calorie and sugar laden monstrosities contained within the bag, those poor men have to wander back to the Temple with 30 bags of the same crap food every day in the week......

After parting with your hard earned money you would like to cross the road to the 7/11 without being killed, but that's well nigh an impossibility, while waiting for a gap in the traffic some nutter runs past you with a 2 stroke monstrosity belching out more oil particles than a Refinery Fire, wasting your favourite shirt. It's not even 7.00am.

Angered by that you decide to walk down to the next 7/11 about 200 metres away on the same side of the road, on the way down you fall into several holes in the pavement, stub your toe 3 times and sprain your ankle. Bleeding, covered in oil, and hobbling, you eventually make it to 7/11, and instead of buying a pint of milk and some cereal bars you end up having to buy some Elastoplast and support bandages. You ask where they keep said supplies and the wee female behind the counter looks at you with a blank stare and says......" no have ".

Realising your mistake you make your way to the pharmacy, not quite open yet so you wait outside cursing this effin country and forget that you haven't put on any sun lotion yet, by the time the pharmacy opens your still bleeding, hobbling and you look like a radiation victim.

Now stocked up with after-sun, bandages, and elastoplast you make your way home, then remember that your hungry, so you nip in to the localThai cafe as you haven't got much money left on you and select from their breakfast range which consists of 3 parts chilli plus one part some other random foodstuff. Mouth burning you get to your room and start to fix the damage of the morning walk, you pick the scab on your toe and bleed all over the sheets, which is going to cost you 1800 baht when room service see it. Exhausted by the sun, you crash out for a couple of hours and when you wake you leave a layer of skin on the sheets, that's really done it now.

It's 11.00am, you've blown well over 2000 baht in incidental damages, and you start to wonder why you like this place, you go for a shower, leave another layer of skin behind, then slip on the way out as non-slip tiles are apparently banned in Thailand. You bang your head and open a bleeding wound above your eye, you grab a towel to stem the blood loss then realize that's you just blown another 400 baht. The cleaning lady is really gonna love you.

it's now approaching Mid-day.....you decide you want to go get some lunch, you get changed into your favourite shorts and make your way to the lift, you do an inconsequential wee fart and get that dreaded follow through feeling, that 3 part chilli one part breakfast has come back to haunt you. You waddle back to your room beseeching the gods to not let it run down your legs or mark your best shorts, just when you get to your door that real cute girl that you've been pursuing for weeks comes out her room next door and flashes you a wonderful smile, which turns to horror when she gets a whiff of the smell and sees the little brown river running down your legs.

Disconsolate you enter your room, go for another shower, come out and inspect your shorts and Calvins and no, sorry......they're ruined too. You spend an hour in the toilet excavating your bowels and your oh so thankful for the Thai bum gun at this point as your seriously stinging.

You get changed, make your way back to the lift with trepidation, promising to never trust a fart again, and successfully make it down stairs, just in time to see the cute girl waiting for the lift back up. She can't look you in the eye, any notion of romantic contact gone forever in a river of sh*t.

It's now after 1.00pm, you sit in a cafe as close to the hotel as possible as your still not sure of your bowel movements. The temp rises to over 35 degrees and the sweats trickling down your back, the locals look at you as if your a weirdo from outer space as your face goes progressively redder and you start to shed skin into your beer. Your bowels play up and you know you ain't making it back to the hotel so you rush to the Thai toilet in the cafe and dread of dread, it's a squat WC, you fumble with your belt and oops, sorry, just a little too late you squat down, another pair of shorts ruined and the results of breakfast sprayed all over the toilet. Almost in tears you slip on the mandatory silk like flooring and fall back into your, ahem, breakfast. You crawl back up to your knees and back reach for the bum gun in the hope of at least fixing the searing pain from your ring, no bum gun.....it's a bucket of water. How the eff do you do that????

After several attempts at cleaning yourself up refill the bucket and try to wash away your, ahem, breakfast. After about 30 minutes you emerge from the toilet to a look of horror from the cafe owner. That white T-shirt was a bad mistake, you look like a sewer rat. You pay your bill, ( it doesn't matter how bad you look or smell, the Thais still want their money ) and you make your way back to your hotel via the shadows, you get into the lift unseen and just when you step out.......

Cute girl is waiting for the lift......she visibly gags when she sees you so feeling a bit tearful and humiliated you decide to spend the rest of the day in your room. THe AC is broken so you call reception, who after 12 attempts of you trying to explain the problem, send you two boiled eggs an incense stick.

Now sweating to death you decide to go on TV to appeal for help, but the internet is down in the hotel, so your stranded......you contemplate calling reception re the internet but your scared of what they'll send you next, ,maybe a baby buffalo and a crash helmet?. You decide to watch TV but True keeps disappearing into a blur so you end up watching Thai soaps.

Contemplating suicide.......your relieved when the sun goes down and your bowels finally settle down. You get changed, head out the door feeling relatively pucker, and flag down a tuk-tuk. You take your standard 80 baht journey to yourbfavourite bar area and the driver demands 200 baht, you end up in a stand up argument in the street which ends when you see a squadron of tuk-tuks heading your way at high speed, you pay the money and wai sheepishly, being sheepish is getting to be quite a habit.

You sit in your favourite bat and try to act all cool and nonchalant......unfortunately the cute girl has been in and told all the staff of your travails so they keep their distance and snigger among themselves. You decide the day can't get any worse so you order up a bottle of whisky and proceed to drown your sorrows. In your rush to get out you forgot your mossy repellent, and the staff won't come anywhere near you, so you no become smorgasboard of tastes for the local mossy population, and you spend the evening slapping your body hard while squealing cos you keep forgetting you've got sunburn.

You stagger home and the most beautiful girl you've ever seen emerges from the shadows, " hellllllo?......where you go????" well that's your day made, in your drunken state your instantly in love and you take this Thai Jennifer Lopez back to your room for some boogie woogie, she strips off and you ain't ever seen breasts as fulsome as this on a Thai lady, wow........then one step beyond.......you ain't ever seen tackle as big as this in your life. Repulsed.....you invite this goddam ladyboy to leave the premises, she ( he?? ) won't go without a 1000 baht payment, you ain't paying a penny so the ladyboy shows you her best Muay Thai moves and beats you to a pulp until you beg for mercy and give her ( him? ) 2000 baht to stop.

Bleeding, ( again) bruised battered and skin peeling from you like a casting snake, you whimper in your bed and feel a high degree of self loathing cos the ladyboy was better hung than you.

Don't worry though.......it won't be long till the Imam starts to wail and so will begin another day in Paradise.

That is a very isolated case from a tourist, 0% relevant to the issue at hand. ALL hotels are already using sitting toilets because most foreigners cannot use squat toilet and don't know why there is a squat toilet.

This Health Ministry campaigns is a country wide push which will severely affect the health of Thai people. sounds like a campaign to make hospitals more rich.

here is the link to all you need to know: http://www.naturesplatform.com/health_benefits.html

[belg]

and in the west, they say it is best to squat to get the last bit out, better against colon cancer...

and if you see shoe prints on the seat, just another farmer using the toilet seat stand on there, must be pretty dangerous to get your footh stuck in the bowl with your own crap

[Greer]

The reason for the change is because of the large number of slip and falls associated with the elderly and people with disabilities. Thailand has an aging population and people are living longer.

This article sums up the plight of the elderly in asia.

http://www.scmp.com/article/540498/fear-public-squat-toilets-confines-elderly-homes

so just add more toilets for the handicapped

Erm... that's what they are advocating... the western style toilet is less of a challenge both for many foreigners as well as those with either permanent or temporary disabilities (pregnancy etc).

[Thaddeus]

Squat toilet has been around hundreds of generations, it's the natural way for the human to defecate.

Some cultures still eat with their fingers, others developed cutlery.

[Greer]

^{To see all the utter rubbish on here about how badly affected the Thai nations general health will be...}

^{It makes me wonder how all the western countries can avoid the enormous expense of keeping up with the dreadfully ill citizens who have to use such a disastrously unhealthy and just plain bad idea as a western toilet!}

^{I bet the western hospitals are all rubbing their hands with glee every time they see another patient hobble in - knowing full well that they are there as a result of the governments plan to make the hospitals wealthy and kill people off by making them sit on western toilets!}

^{....or maybe things aren't quite as bad as that... just western propaganda for sure - millions are really dropping like flies from pooping while they sit, but the western media refuses to acknowledge it, and the government taxes the hospitals on the extra they make from the unhealthy poo brigade, and pays off the media as long as they don't let the secret out - and you thought Rupert got rich from TV...hah! More fool you!}

[sirchai]

Mr. Cholanan said such a traditional toilet can be unsafe and cause arthritis, if used for a long time, particularly among the elderly.

What a bunch of rubbish.......

[Dr Wanchai]

Lessen arthritis risks, but increase hernia risks according to Confucius.

[osiboy]

if the western style toilets are in a town such as pattaya, it won't make much difference as most arabs,indians and pakistanis will still stand on a toilet seat , seperate toilets is the best way to go, a few squat style for those from stone age countries would help .

[Pimay1]

When I see a squat toilet I see many risks and arthritis is not one of them.

For example? what do you "see" as risks? have you "got" any of them? if not, then you're hypothetical.

Oh really? A member on Thaivisa recently complained that he was fed up with people asking him what it was like in Thailand.....I advised him to tell the truth. Here's what I said......

Och you're living the fantasy life in their minds......stop being so petty minded and just tell them the truth. Thailand is a nightmare!!

Your day begins with the Imam wailing at 5.30 in the morning cos you've just found out why that hotel was so cheap on the internet, he quietens down after 5 minutes but now you can hear the effin cockerels trying to impersonate him and the Soi dogs barking at the World. You wander outside in a dazed and get harassed by annoying wee women wanting you to buy pre-packed lunch boxes for the poor Monks who stand there silently beseeching you not to buy the calorie and sugar laden monstrosities contained within the bag, those poor men have to wander back to the Temple with 30 bags of the same crap food every day in the week......

After parting with your hard earned money you would like to cross the road to the 7/11 without being killed, but that's well nigh an impossibility, while waiting for a gap in the traffic some nutter runs past you with a 2 stroke monstrosity belching out more oil particles than a Refinery Fire, wasting your favourite shirt. It's not even 7.00am.

Angered by that you decide to walk down to the next 7/11 about 200 metres away on the same side of the road, on the way down you fall into several holes in the pavement, stub your toe 3 times and sprain your ankle. Bleeding, covered in oil, and hobbling, you eventually make it to 7/11, and instead of buying a pint of milk and some cereal bars you end up having to buy some Elastoplast and support bandages. You ask where they keep said supplies and the wee female behind the counter looks at you with a blank stare and says......" no have ".

Realising your mistake you make your way to the pharmacy, not quite open yet so you wait outside cursing this effin country and forget that you haven't put on any sun lotion yet, by the time the pharmacy opens your still bleeding, hobbling and you look like a radiation victim.

Now stocked up with after-sun, bandages, and elastoplast you make your way home, then remember that your hungry, so you nip in to the localThai cafe as you haven't got much money left on you and select from their breakfast range which consists of 3 parts chilli plus one part some other random foodstuff. Mouth burning you get to your room and start to fix the damage of the morning walk, you pick the scab on your toe and bleed all over the sheets, which is going to cost you 1800 baht when room service see it. Exhausted by the sun, you crash out for a couple of hours and when you wake you leave a layer of skin on the sheets, that's really done it now.

It's 11.00am, you've blown well over 2000 baht in incidental damages, and you start to wonder why you like this place, you go for a shower, leave another layer of skin behind, then slip on the way out as non-slip tiles are apparently banned in Thailand. You bang your head and open a bleeding wound above your eye, you grab a towel to stem the blood loss then realize that's you just blown another 400 baht. The cleaning lady is really gonna love you.

it's now approaching Mid-day.....you decide you want to go get some lunch, you get changed into your favourite shorts and make your way to the lift, you do an inconsequential wee fart and get that dreaded follow through feeling, that 3 part chilli one part breakfast has come back to haunt you. You waddle back to your room beseeching the gods to not let it run down your legs or mark your best shorts, just when you get to your door that real cute girl that you've been pursuing for weeks comes out her room next door and flashes you a wonderful smile, which turns to horror when she gets a whiff of the smell and sees the little brown river running down your legs.

Disconsolate you enter your room, go for another shower, come out and inspect your shorts and Calvins and no, sorry......they're ruined too. You spend an hour in the toilet excavating your bowels and your oh so thankful for the Thai bum gun at this point as your seriously stinging.

You get changed, make your way back to the lift with trepidation, promising to never trust a fart again, and successfully make it down stairs, just in time to see the cute girl waiting for the lift back up. She can't look you in the eye, any notion of romantic contact gone forever in a river of sh*t.

It's now after 1.00pm, you sit in a cafe as close to the hotel as possible as your still not sure of your bowel movements. The temp rises to over 35 degrees and the sweats trickling down your back, the locals look at you as if your a weirdo from outer space as your face goes progressively redder and you start to shed skin into your beer. Your bowels play up and you know you ain't making it back to the hotel so you rush to the Thai toilet in the cafe and dread of dread, it's a squat WC, you fumble with your belt and oops, sorry, just a little too late you squat down, another pair of shorts ruined and the results of breakfast sprayed all over the toilet. Almost in tears you slip on the mandatory silk like flooring and fall back into your, ahem, breakfast. You crawl back up to your knees and back reach for the bum gun in the hope of at least fixing the searing pain from your ring, no bum gun.....it's a bucket of water. How the eff do you do that????

After several attempts at cleaning yourself up refill the bucket and try to wash away your, ahem, breakfast. After about 30 minutes you emerge from the toilet to a look of horror from the cafe owner. That white T-shirt was a bad mistake, you look like a sewer rat. You pay your bill, ( it doesn't matter how bad you look or smell, the Thais still want their money ) and you make your way back to your hotel via the shadows, you get into the lift unseen and just when you step out.......

Cute girl is waiting for the lift......she visibly gags when she sees you so feeling a bit tearful and humiliated you decide to spend the rest of the day in your room. THe AC is broken so you call reception, who after 12 attempts of you trying to explain the problem, send you two boiled eggs an incense stick.

Now sweating to death you decide to go on TV to appeal for help, but the internet is down in the hotel, so your stranded......you contemplate calling reception re the internet but your scared of what they'll send you next, ,maybe a baby buffalo and a crash helmet?. You decide to watch TV but True keeps disappearing into a blur so you end up watching Thai soaps.

Contemplating suicide.......your relieved when the sun goes down and your bowels finally settle down. You get changed, head out the door feeling relatively pucker, and flag down a tuk-tuk. You take your standard 80 baht journey to yourbfavourite bar area and the driver demands 200 baht, you end up in a stand up argument in the street which ends when you see a squadron of tuk-tuks heading your way at high speed, you pay the money and wai sheepishly, being sheepish is getting to be quite a habit.

You sit in your favourite bat and try to act all cool and nonchalant......unfortunately the cute girl has been in and told all the staff of your travails so they keep their distance and snigger among themselves. You decide the day can't get any worse so you order up a bottle of whisky and proceed to drown your sorrows. In your rush to get out you forgot your mossy repellent, and the staff won't come anywhere near you, so you no become smorgasboard of tastes for the local mossy population, and you spend the evening slapping your body hard while squealing cos you keep forgetting you've got sunburn.

You stagger home and the most beautiful girl you've ever seen emerges from the shadows, " hellllllo?......where you go????" well that's your day made, in your drunken state your instantly in love and you take this Thai Jennifer Lopez back to your room for some boogie woogie, she strips off and you ain't ever seen breasts as fulsome as this on a Thai lady, wow........then one step beyond.......you ain't ever seen tackle as big as this in your life. Repulsed.....you invite this goddam ladyboy to leave the premises, she ( he?? ) won't go without a 1000 baht payment, you ain't paying a penny so the ladyboy shows you her best Muay Thai moves and beats you to a pulp until you beg for mercy and give her ( him? ) 2000 baht to stop.

Bleeding, ( again) bruised battered and skin peeling from you like a casting snake, you whimper in your bed and feel a high degree of self loathing cos the ladyboy was better hung than you.

Don't worry though.......it won't be long till the Imam starts to wail and so will begin another day in Paradise.

LMAO Steven Spielberg could learn a thing or two from you.

[laislica]

Squat toilet has been around hundreds of generations, it's the natural way for the human to defecate.

Some cultures still eat with their fingers, others developed cutlery.

You're not supposed to eat it!!

[laislica]

^{To see all the utter rubbish on here about how badly affected the Thai nations general health will be...}

^{It makes me wonder how all the western countries can avoid the enormous expense of keeping up with the dreadfully ill citizens who have to use such a disastrously unhealthy and just plain bad idea as a western toilet!}

^{I bet the western hospitals are all rubbing their hands with glee every time they see another patient hobble in - knowing full well that they are there as a result of the governments plan to make the hospitals wealthy and kill people off by making them sit on western toilets!}

^{....or maybe things aren't quite as bad as that... just western propaganda for sure - millions are really dropping like flies from pooping while they sit, but the western media refuses to acknowledge it, and the government taxes the hospitals on the extra they make from the unhealthy poo brigade, and pays off the media as long as they don't let the secret out - and you thought Rupert got rich from TV...hah! More fool you!}

Strange but true:

Whilst on a European Loo one evening, my mum strained so hard that small blood vessels in both eyes burst and she was blind by morning.

There are also many heart attacks due to straining on the loo.

EDIT

No Sh1t !!

Sorry, couldn't help myself.

Edited April 30, 2013 by laislica

[dontejo]

How high will the new toilet be??

Most new toilets in Thailand are to low.

I sit with my head between my knees.

[hellodolly]

This is old news from last year. More rhetoric, no action - so far.

Wrong there has been action when my 86 year old mother in law moved I had to buy and install a western toilet as her knees could not take the stress.

I do believe though that all government squat toilets had to be converted and any new buildings had to have western toilets.

[hellodolly]

When I see a squat toilet I see many risks and arthritis is not one of them.

For example? what do you "see" as risks? have you "got" any of them? if not, then you're hypothetical.

Arthritis is caused by a LACK of nutrition!!!

quitting junk, heated oil, sugar, fried food, sauce, soda, fast food, batter, milk, cheese, etc.. THIS WILL STOP YOUR BODY FROM GETTING WORSE.

But then how do you prevent insanity.

You beat me to it.

Then I got to thinking it over and the nutrition answer made no sense. There is nutrition in those things more than enough to stop arthritis if that was what was causing it.

These health food people will make up all kinds of things to justify there way of thinking.

One thread asked where they could find cereal that fell with in their idea of balanced and organically grown. I provided the answer. There response was they didn't like the cardboard box it was sold in.

Even though it was 100% recycled paperboard.

As I say they will spout any kind of nonsense to get you too believe as they do.

Western toilets will be a big help to a lot of the elderly and they will be a bit of help in stopping the onset of arthritis in later years for the youth of today.

[MyFriend You]

When I see a squat toilet I see many risks and arthritis is not one of them.

I agree, my first 3 years in Thailand in Chon Buri, mostly Sattahip, Bang Chang, Rayong in my early years in Thailand - all we had were squat toiltes....the only improvement we made were handle bars on both walls - (Americans were BIG) I'm 63, and to this day I don't have hemeroids,but a lot of my friends do - GO FIGURE..........why was the Squat Toilet voted the Best in Europe sometime in 1980's - Straightens out the GUTS while you Shi'it, GO FIGURE............Hey I am only sharing this because

1. I don't have Hemeroids

2. I don't read magazines while I am on the Toilet

3. I have a Throne Toilet in my house = with a squat toilet right next to it, makes better sense than the french Biddae' squirt toilet yo find in hotels...........how many of you have actually squirted cold water up your bum to clean it??????

[rametindallas]

The reason for the change is because of the large number of slip and falls associated with the elderly and people with disabilities. Thailand has an aging population and people are living longer.

This article sums up the plight of the elderly in asia.

http://www.scmp.com/article/540498/fear-public-squat-toilets-confines-elderly-homes

so just add more toilets for the handicapped

Erm... that's what they are advocating... the western style toilet is less of a challenge both for many foreigners as well as those with either permanent or temporary disabilities (pregnancy etc).

Actually, NO they are advocating replacing ALL squat toilets for Western toilets NOT ADDING, at lesser expense, a Handicapped toilet. Please reread the OP

[attrayant]

Is it even possible to use one without taking your pants completely off? I attempted to use on some years ago and after a few fumbles, the only way I could manage it was by getting totally nekkid from the waist down. This of course required me to go barefoot in a room the probably gets regularly flooded with human waste water, which was a sickening prospect all by itself.

And yes, it was hell on my knees and I was only in my mid-forties at the time. I've no intention of ever trying that again.

[Thaddeus]

How high will the new toilet be??

Most new toilets in Thailand are to low.

I sit with my head between my knees.

Are you agoblin, or is it just a headache.

(coat already on)

[NanLaew]

Squat toilet has been around hundreds of generations, it's the natural way for the human to defecate.

Some cultures still eat with their fingers, others developed cutlery.

LOL. My mate used to get all riled up when his GF's relatives used to visit and throw down the rush mat, sit cross-legged on the ground and eat with their hands. He insisted they use the table in the gazebo. The look on his face when they threw the mat on the table, climbed on and sat cross legged on the table top eating with their hands was priceless. Edited April 30, 2013 by NanLaew

[JetsetBkk]

i'm assuming the whole point is that western-style toilets can be used by everyone and anyone, whether overweight, pregnant, old and frail.. i wouldn't say i'm severely overweight or anything, but i'm not a small guy and using one of those squat toilets isn't a pleasant experience. i'm sure my pregnant gf would also agree it's not comfortable for her to squat right now either. all down to personal preference i suppose, but it would be nice to have the option of a western-style toilet in more public places, in particular at service stations. i don't really frequent any other places with squat bogs

Your "pregnant gf"? I'm assuming - hoping - that your nick name relates to your year of birth and not to your age.