Vachira Hospital Phuket opens ebola lab

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Vachira Hospital Phuket opens ebola lab
Nattha Thepbamrung


A technician demonstrates the new equipment installed at Vachira Hospital's new Designated Receiving Area

PHUKET: Vachira Hospital Phuket yesterday opened the region's first ebola testing lab and Designated Receiving Area (DRA).

The new, specially-equipped unit is the third such facility in the country and the first in Southern Thailand dedicated to testing and treating patients suspected of suffering from ebola and other serious conditions such as dengue fever and malaria.

The unit is equipped with biological safety cabinet (BSC), allowing blood tests to be carried out in isolation, as well as high-pressure sterilizing equipment and machines to perform automated blood counts and detect biochemicals.

Inside the lab technicians wear special biological protection suits or PPEs (Personal Protective Equipment).

Presiding over the official opening of the new unit was Deputy Director-General of the Department of Medical Science under the Ministry of Public Health, Wanchai Sattayawuthipong.

“With world-wide concern about the spread of ebola, the Ministry of Public Health plans to establish 30 DRA labs across the country by the end of next year. Phuket is the first province in Southern Thailand to have its own lab,” said Mr Wanchai.

Patients that test positive for ebola can then be treated at the facility.

Phuket was chosen as one of the first provinces in the country to be equipped with a DRA lab due to the high number of international visitors to the province.

There have been no cases of ebola reported in Thailand but 300 people have been treated for dengue fever including one fatality reported so far this year, said Mr Wanchai.

Source: http://www.thephuketnews.com/vachira-hospital-phuket-opens-ebola-lab-49714.php


-- Phuket News 2014-11-18

[schlog]

No funds to fix huge holes in the roads but a ebola show lab. Will they also start now monitoring the general public justified by a ebola show outbreak like in the States?

Edited November 18, 2014 by schlog

[terryp]

IMO they know something and getting ready....to invest huge money into tech labs like this is not done without much planning and thought

[orange31]

IMO they know something and getting ready....to invest huge money into tech labs like this is not done without much planning and thought

I doubt it. The Ebola outbreak has been going on in Africa for qute a while now (almost a year) and the figures seems to indicate that the spread of the outbreak has started to slow. In more developed countries (like America and even Thailand) where communication is much better it's highly unlikely that the virus would be able to spread to the same extent as it has in Africa.

To be honest, it's more likely just a big 'show off' - "look as us, aren't we great with our shiny new Ebola lab etc.", irrespective of how much money they've just spent.

... much planning and thought .... mmmm... I'm skeptical about that

[Briggsy]

My corruption detection device has just gone off the scale.

[JetsetBkk]

I feel so much safer now.

[madmitch]

We had a Nigerian checked in last week. He only stayed one night before flying to Bangkok but I was quite surprised when we received a visit from a Thai health official on Sunday afternoon, enquiring as to his whereabouts.

Maybe they were going to take him for a free ride to the facility described above, maybe they were just making sure he hadn't developed any ebola symptoms whilst here. I didn't find out but they are taking this seriously in Phuket, though the numbers of arrivals from West Africa would be very small. The health official had four on his list.

To do the same in the area of London I come from would be an impossibility!

[Briggsy]

Mitch, I do not they are not "taking it seriously", what they are doing is creating a facade of a working unit in order to justify the expense which was created simply in order to skim the customary 25%.

Are they whisking away offshore workers with Western nationalities returning from Nigeria? I doubt it.