Covid-19 News & Updates (Thailand and Southeast Asia only)

[HHTel]

Just been reading about the various conspiracy theories connected to COVID-19 especially the ridiculous 5G theory which resulted in many arson attacks on masts.

One theory I thought was particularly funny was this one:

After the British government issued shelter-in-place orders on March 23, some conspiracy theorists commented that it was a trick to secretly build 5G masts out of public view.

But lots of people actually believe this nonsense which makes it dangerous.

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/spotligh ... li=BBoPWjQ

[PeteC]

South Korea reported on Friday that 91 recovered coronavirus patients have tested positive for the disease again, raising questions over health experts' understanding of the pandemic.

The prospect of people being re-infected with the virus is of international concern, as many countries are hoping that infected populations will develop sufficient immunity to prevent a resurgence of the pandemic.

The reports have also prompted fears the virus may remain active in patients for much longer than was previously thought.

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/coronavi ... li=BBoPWjQ

There are reports from other countries about a second infection.

I doubt that these people are actually being re-infected. The odds of that just don't stack up. My guess is that the virus changes to a dormant state and 'hides' only to come out to play later!

This appears to be a clever virus with characteristics never seen before. This puts a different slant on results of up and coming 'anti-body' tests. There was a hope that large swathes of the population would gain some immunity.

That is the worst news I've read since all of this started. If correct the possible implications are staggering.

[hhinner]

South Korea reported on Friday that 91 recovered coronavirus patients have tested positive for the disease again, raising questions over health experts' understanding of the pandemic.

The prospect of people being re-infected with the virus is of international concern, as many countries are hoping that infected populations will develop sufficient immunity to prevent a resurgence of the pandemic.

The reports have also prompted fears the virus may remain active in patients for much longer than was previously thought.

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/coronavi ... li=BBoPWjQ

There are reports from other countries about a second infection.

I doubt that these people are actually being re-infected. The odds of that just don't stack up. My guess is that the virus changes to a dormant state and 'hides' only to come out to play later!

This appears to be a clever virus with characteristics never seen before. This puts a different slant on results of up and coming 'anti-body' tests. There was a hope that large swathes of the population would gain some immunity.

That is the worst news I've read since all of this started. If correct the possible implications are staggering.

Other viruses go dormant and can 'come out' later, for example herpes, chicken pox. Does this reemergence really cast doubt on the effectiveness of antibody tests? Perhaps a functional antibody test would have shown a lack or insufficiency of antibodies in those patients who have been reinfected or had a relapse.

[handdrummer]

There is a Thai doctor who is successfully treating Covid-19 patients with plasma. (re Thai TV news.)

[sateeb]

Thai government confirms 45 new coronavirus infections, 2 new fatalities
Cod Satrusayang
By
Cod Satrusayang
April 11, 2020

Thailand’s government confirmed on Saturday that it had discovered 45 new coronavirus infections bringing the total number of infected to 2,518.

There were 2 new fatalities bringing the death toll to 35.

122 more patients have recovered from the virus bringing the total number of discharged patients to 1135.

“We are still discovering new coronavirus cases from those returning from abroad in State Quarantine,” said government spokesman Dr Thaweesin Visanuyothin. “Even though we check them before they board the plane, when they arrive and before they enter quarantine, we are still discovering cases.”

Songkran

The government has asked its citizens to forego or find alternatives to Thailand’s traditional Songkran new year celebrations which usually involve the close gathering of family groups and various ceremonies.

The government has canceled the holiday, which was due to run from Monday, April 13 to Wednesday, April 15 and said that the holiday would be held at a later date in the year.

Both Prime Minister Prayut Chan-ocha and Dr Thaweesin advocated for virtual gatherings instead of physical ones to maintain social isolation.

https://www.thaienquirer.com/11216/thai ... atalities/

[Big Boy]

[PET]

South Korea reported on Friday that 91 recovered coronavirus patients have tested positive for the disease again, raising questions over health experts' understanding of the pandemic.

The prospect of people being re-infected with the virus is of international concern, as many countries are hoping that infected populations will develop sufficient immunity to prevent a resurgence of the pandemic.

The reports have also prompted fears the virus may remain active in patients for much longer than was previously thought.

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/coronavi ... li=BBoPWjQ

There are reports from other countries about a second infection.

I doubt that these people are actually being re-infected. The odds of that just don't stack up. My guess is that the virus changes to a dormant state and 'hides' only to come out to play later!

This appears to be a clever virus with characteristics never seen before. This puts a different slant on results of up and coming 'anti-body' tests. There was a hope that large swathes of the population would gain some immunity.

That is the worst news I've read since all of this started. If correct the possible implications are staggering.

Yes Peter - if this news was correct the implications are staggering - so why can I not find world news reporting on this , after all it is said to have come out of Korea yesterday, I hope my relief is not short lived!

[PeteC]

MSN picked it up from The Telegraph in London as indicated on the link. It also appears at:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles ... n-cdc-says

https://www.usnews.com/news/world-repor ... tive-again

https://nationalpost.com/news/world/rec ... outh-korea

https://nypost.com/2020/04/10/recovered ... ive-again/

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-heal ... SKCN21S15X

...and others. I think we can be pretty sure that it's not fake news.

[sateeb]

Disgraceful that these deaths not recorded..

Hundreds of UK care home deaths not added to official coronavirus toll...
Hundreds of people are dying in care homes from confirmed or suspected coronavirus without yet being officially counted, the Guardian has learned.

More than 120 residents of the UK’s largest charitable provider of care homes are thought to have died from the virus in the last three weeks, while another network of care homes is reported to have recorded 88 deaths.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/ ... icial-toll

The UK recorded 980 hospital deaths on Thursday, bringing the total to 8,958.

That death toll, which does not include those who died in care homes or the community, has exceeded the worst daily figures seen in Italy and Spain.

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk

[Spitfire]

If we look back at the Spanish flu then it came and went on for three waves over two and a half years or so. This virus could easily be the same and could go on for a bit. As for the testing thing, could be some shaky test devices going around and especially earlier on ... maybe the new ones are better. Also, seems there are 3 strains of this virus and people could be being reinfected with another strain that is also hanging around. Might have to gain immunity from all three before being good to go. Plenty of speculation there but seems there is much we don't yet know.

Edit - Typos

[HHTel]

Whilst I agree that there are mutations of this virus around, it's still against the odds that someone already having had the virus is re-infected by a mutation of the same virus. Take Korea as the example. They have 204 cases per million capita. For some of those 204 to get re-infected by another strain is against all odds. Take that to the total population > 50 million it becomes even less believable.

It appears that the virus in these cases just never went away. There could be thousands of others. We just don't know.
Alternatively, the quality of the tests may be suspect, although, as far as I know, to be recovered requires more than one negative test.

[Big Boy]

Today's numbers (will replace with better version if/when it is published) - updated:

92574915_1645886232225876_4322621503792218112_o.jpg

(266.99 KiB) Downloaded 198 times

[J.J.B.]

Immunology is one of the most mind-bendingly complex of all the fields of medical studies. I still have one of my textbooks from Uni when it was part of my degree course over 25 years ago and I’m fairly sure that most of what’s in it has now been superseded with what we’ve learned from even the past five years, let alone 25.

Some of the basics haven’t changed, and that includes the key types of immunoglobulins (Ig), or ‘antibodies’ found in the blood that goes to make up our humoral immune response. There are five subclasses of Ig: A; G; M; D & E. In relatively simple terms, when healthy people are infected with a pathogen, in this case a virus, their immune system rapidly produces IgM in large quantities to activate our total immune response and overpower the infection. This antibody can be detected when people have Covid-19 but it rapidly decreases once the infection has past.

IgG is part of our adaptive immune system and forms part of our ‘immune memory’, it is this antibody that circulates around our bodies for weeks, months and even years after an infection and is the one that is targeted for use in vaccine inoculation. The goal is to create IgG in response to a weak or attenuated form of a pathogen and this works incredibly effectively for smallpox, mumps, measles etc. [insert any AntiVax BS here].

From what I’ve understood from colleagues who are expert in this field and active in studying Covid-19—bearing in mind this is a totally new virus—not all people who have had the infection produce any or enough IgG to be detected by serological tests (the non cellular component of blood). Current figures seem to be around 30% but that’s pretty unreliable. This is different from dormancy behaviour seen in viruses like Herpes Simplex, which live in our nerve cells and flare-up from time-to-time. This virus appears to cause all kinds of problems with our immune systems aside from all this and feel free to google ‘cytokine storm’ at your leisure, but the bottom line is this:

There is still no reliable serological test to determine whether people have had the infection or not, so whether they have developed any immunity or not.

You will understand that this makes the whole social distancing thing more important as we can’t tell apart the immune in society from the susceptible so would be better off not to take any risk. It also puts the notion of a near-term, effective vaccine into question as we can’t tell who will produce the necessary IgG and, again, we can’t reliably test for it to know whether it’s been effective. Be assured, however, that huge efforts are being made to learn more about this virus and our reaction to it, and there are far brighter minds than mine working on it, which can only be a good thing! These people deserve our thanks.

[Spitfire]

It would be interesting to know the blood groups of those re-infected, and just infected, when this is done as it is being reported that blood group A people are most at risk (something to do with the sugars that coat cells as that's how the virus attaches itself to) as this blood group is most easy to attach to. Also, will be interesting to see if there are different strengths regarding how strong each of the 3 mutations are. Research (admitted not peer reviewed yet) from China shows that blood groups might play a part in whether you get infected and to what extent ... although there are likely to be many other factors that influence it too.

The paradox here for somewhere like Thailand is that considering the screw-up way the authorities have reacted, then it should be a total disaster here with people falling dead at home and everywhere plus hospitals over-run like in the northern hemisphere and they wouldn't be able to hush-it-up or sweep it under the carpet. There must be some truth in the heat/humidity theory and the fact that everyone has been wearing masks from early on plus doing the social distancing as Thailand is not that densely populated (other than a few places that have seen a sprinkling of cases compared to other parts of the world). It almost looks like they have dodged the bullet somehow and it's more by luck than anything else as people should be dropping like flies, but it hasn't happened (fortunately so far).

However, I also think that this virus has been doing the rounds for quite a while before it was noticed and China's misinformation and cover-up was finally blown away ... maybe mid November or something. Also, I think many people have already had it and just had no symptoms or just mild ones and passed it off as the flu or common cold, then recovered and not given it another thought. It is strange though that some get it then recover with symptoms then recover, and some get it and boom gone 5 days later, and some don't even notice it.

[europtimiste]

Best reaction to Covid-19 was in Taiwan. Only 229 infected and 2 deaths.