Thailand’s Rural Doctors Society (RDS) has completed its mission to help conduct COVID-19 mass testing on at least 50,000 people in 26 locations across Bangkok, Samut Prakan and Nakhon Pathom, with 10,357 people tested positive over the five-day period.
The RDS found that 10,357 people, of the 96,087 it tested between August 4th and 8th, had contracted COVID-19. Of those infected, 9,790 underwent RT-PCR testing. False results accounted for 0.55% of those tested while 70.2% exhibited few or no symptoms. Some 27.3% suffered moderate symptoms and 2.5% were severe cases.
RDS chairman Supat Hasuwannakit said that, in theory, keeping sufferers with mild symptoms in the home isolation program and sending the medium and critical cases to hospital might work well. The government must deploy enough people to conduct COVID-19 testing, as it helps remove the sick from those who are still healthy, which can keep the transmission in check.
He noted that the efficiency and speed with which the program can move could not keep pace with the rapid spread of the virus. The government must quickly add an additional 100,000 beds in hospitals to tackle shortages in response to the severity of the COVID-19 situation. (NNT)
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