As Thailand’s initial good management of the Covid crisis continues to collapse, health officials in the Thai capital have recorded yet another day of record numbers of cases.
Those 15,376 new cases announced on Monday morning take the total number of Covid cases in Thailand to more than half a million since the first ones were reported in early 2020.
Eight seven new deaths were also added to the country’s mortality numbers, giving Thailand a total of 4,146 deaths of people testing positive for Covid-19.
The 15,376 cases reported for Sunday were slightly more than the previous day’s 15,335.
The actual number of Covid-19 cases in Thailand could be much higher, however, as Dr. Apisamai Srirangson, a Centre for Covid-19 Situation Administration (CCSA) spokesperson explained “The new cases do not include results from antigen tests yet. Those results will be reported this week”.
With Thailand mandating everyone who tests positive for Covid be admitted to hospital, even if asymptomatic, that also gives the country one of the world’s highest hospitalization rates with a reported 167,057 in-patients still receiving treatment for Covid-19.
As those who are asymptomatic are now being told to stay at home, the number of those hospitalized should quickly fall into the regions seen in other countries.
Dr Apisamai said in today’s Covid-19 briefing most of the latest deaths were the elderly with pre-existing conditions, or those with chronic illnesses.
This is the same as has been reported in every other country dealing with the Covid-19 crisis.
Dr Apisamai also said new deaths were now being reported nationwide and no longer centered in dark red zones. This is likely to increase as the virus continues to spread outside dark red zones.
As the Thai government suggested infected people return to their home provinces for treatment last week, that reality is to be expected.
