Thailand’s COVID-19 response an example of resilience and solidarity: a UN Resident Coordinator blog
LOOKS LIKE your president has obvious aspirations to be an actor.
He was so dramatic in his last appearance, proclaiming: “Gusto ko na nga umiyak sa harap ninyo pero naubos na ang luha ko. Hay, buhay. Kung alam lang ninyo, para akong dumadaan ng purgatory ngayon, at this time. Kung may power ako like a magic wand na maalis kaagad itong problema natin, gagawin ko."
But he has the power to respond to the virus quickly. Di niya lang ginamit.
March 24 of last year, he signed a law granting him emergency powers to re-align, re-program and re-allocated funds in the nation’s budget to be used for response to the covid virus. He also borrowed trillions of money from other countries.
After one year, what happened? The situation got worse, worst!!!!
They should have quickly resorted to mass testing but they did not, so there are thousands or perhaps millions of undetected people infected by the virus and carriers roaming around without their knowledge.
The government should have instituted mass testing early on so that positive cases can be quickly isolated and stopped in spreading the virus they are carrying. Without such measures, these lockdowns will all be useless and we’ll just have repeated lockdowns.
Thailand is so near China and yet they were able to contain the virus right away. They just had an internationally beauty pageant held there, face to face.
As of now, they have less than 5,000 infections and only 60 plus deaths.
Medical teams offered immediate care to persons who tested positive. Anyone confirmed to be infected is hospitalized, even if they’re asymptomatic or just had mild symptoms.
This is a policy that reduced the risk of transmitting the virus to others.
They now have 250 mass testing centers in their country and they can have early detection of any suspected case.
Results come out in 24 hours, allowing early treatment.
A World Health Organization report on Thailand’s response to the virus, produced in July, stated that the case fatality rate was only around 1.7%.
This shows the importance of mass testing, which, up to now, sadly, we don’t have. Instead, they put the money in that dolomite beach along Roxas Blvd. How idiotic is that?
And this also shows that a country needs really good managers to contain problems like this, unlike ours na nagdadrama pa nang wala namang kawawaan.
We don’t need drama. We need action!
