Neill Fronde
- Thailand News
GPO plans quality testing on arriving Chinese Lepu antigen kits
After a rollercoaster ride of okays, protests, pauses, confirmation, cancellation, and reinstatement, 8.5 million controversial Chinese-made Covid-19 antigen test kits are set to arrive in Thailand early next week. The Government Pharmaceutical Organisation now plans on conducting quality testing on the kits made by Lepu Medical Technology with the help of Ramathibodi Hospital to reassure people of their accuracy. The…
- Bangkok News
Department stores follow strict Covid-19 safety to remain open
In Bangkok and other dark red provinces across Thailand, department stores have finally been allowed to reopen and it seems that many are bending over backwards to follow Covid-19 safety measures in an attempt to assure they remain open. Department stores have been closed or severely restricted for months due to the Emergency decree and protective measures the government has…
- Covid-19 News
Sunday afternoon Update: Provincial Covid-19 totals
224 Coronavirus-related deaths and 15,452 new Covid-19 infections were reported today by Thailand’s Centre for Covid-19 Situation Administration. The infection trend has declined over the past week, but the daily fatality count remains high. 4,682 patients remain in a serious condition and 1,008 are on artificial respiration as of last night. Nearly 187,000 people received their first vaccine yesterday and…
- Phuket News
Phuket Covid-19: 3 Sandbox infections, no deaths, 3,000+ recovered
Today marked 3 new Covid-19 infections identified in international travellers who arrived via the Phuket Sandbox programme but saw no new Covid-19 deaths on the island and 240 new infections, down 2 from yesterday’s daily total. Another milestone was hit, this time more positive than yesterday’s surpassing of 5,000 infections in Phuket, as today saw the number of people recovered…
- Tourism News
Tourists flood Khao Yai Park after viral video of curious bear
Attendance at Khao Yai National Park has boomed so much thanks to a viral video that they are now having to limit the number of people who can visit. People were drawn to the park after a video was posted to Facebook showing an Asian black bear visiting a food stall in the park attempting to eat an omelette and…
- Crime News
Thitisan refutes murder, argues for assault charges instead
Thitisan “Jo Ferrari” Utthanaphon, along with the other 6 police in custody now for the fatal torture of a 25 year old drug suspect, denies the charges against him and is now claiming he merely assaulted the man which led to his death. Thitisan’s lawyer met with him at Phitsanulok prison last week and dispelled rumours that his client suffered…
- Expats
Another missing expat man found safe after being lost in forest
For the second time in as many days, an older expat man has been found after being lost in a forest for a few days. Yesterday a British man in Khon Kaen was found after being lost 3 days in a forest when he wandered off his motorbike for a stroll and couldn’t find his way back. Now today in…
- Technology News
Facebook video recommendations disabled after labelling black men Primates
Facebook has disabled their topic recommendation features on videos today after the AI software appears to have mistaken black men in a video for monkeys. The video in question was from the British tabloid The Daily Mail and was title “White man calls cops on black men at marina.” But under the video where auto-generated suggestions are made to encourage…
- Phuket News
Phuket Covid-19 passes 5,000 infections, bed occupancy up 5%
Covid-19 data for Phuket was fairly stable yesterday with no new deaths, no new international Sandbox travellers infected, and the total daily cases today were 242, just 7 more than yesterday. Those new infections pushed Phuket’s total number of infections since the start of the third wave of Covid-19 to surpass 5,000 today. Statistically, the most drastic Covid-19 figure was…
- Covid-19 News
Covid-19 deaths still high, infections falling, provincial totals
The daily numbers of Covid-19 infections in Thailand have remained steady around the 15,000 mark, a drop from the peak and recent daily totals well above 20,000 infections. Today’s 257 deaths still remains a high figure but is expected to ease over time. Out of 1.26 million people infected in Thailand since the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic, over 1…
- Politics News
PM Prayut, 5 ministers win votes to beat no-confidence charge
After 4 days of intense debates in the censure proceedings that called for a vote of no-confidence for PM Prayut Chan-o-cha and 5 top ministers in his cabinet, the group all avoided the no-confidence votes. There was a lot of talk about secret political deals aligning the Palang Pracharath Party and the Pheu Thai party, along with a coalition of…
- Covid-19 News
Japan to donate 300,000 more AstraZeneca vaccines next week
The Japanese embassy in Bangkok made an announcement today that their government will again donate AstraZeneca vaccines to Thailand. Japan donated 1.05 million AstraZeneca vaccines to Thailand at the beginning of July and have declared that another shipment of 300,000 vaccines will be forthcoming. The second shipment of AstraZeneca vaccines from Japan is slated to arrive on September 8, this…
- Northern Thailand News
British man Barry found 3 days after getting lost in forest
Barry Weller enjoys nature and taking his motorbike to cruise through the local scenery in Khon Kaen. He would regularly go out for afternoon rides to explore the rice paddies and forest in the area, but would always return before dark. But on Tuesday afternoon the British man told his Thai wife that he was off for a ride through…
- Northern Thailand News
4.6 million methamphetamine pills found on som tam vendor turned smuggler
If you like your spicy papaya salad with a little extra kick, a som tam vendor in Nakhon Phanom was arrested today with 4.6 million speed pills. The woman was apprehended when border patrol police in Tambon Saenphan searched her pickup truck and discovered 10 big fertiliser bags holding 4,622,000 speed pills. The woman told police she earned her money…
- Northern Thailand News
Gold shop robbed by officer from investigating police station
A policeman’s swagger was the downfall that led to the identification and subsequent arrest of a gold jewellery shop robber today in the Pak Chong district of Nakhon Ratchasima. A man dressed in a food delivery outfit robbed a gold shop and shot the shop owner on Wednesday and was later identified as a local police officer. The robber entered…
- Politics News
Coalition of parties said to be plotting for PM Prayut’s removal
Members of some of the parliament’s smaller parties confirmed the existence of a rumoured plot brewed amongst a coalition of parties to unseat PM Prayut Chan-o-cha. The revelation and confirmation of this plot details the effort of several parties to come together and remove the Prime Minister from power. The New Palangdharma Party said that it will take a coalition…
- Phuket News
Phuket daily Covid-19: 235 infections, no death, no Sandboxers
As Phuket prepares to carefully allow domestic tourists back onto the island, Covid-19 numbers remain relatively stable. Daily infections were 235 today, with 6 of the last 7 days reaching above 200. No new deaths were reported and no new Sandbox infections were identified. With the influx of new hospital beds yesterday, the bed occupancy rate remained around 70% though…
- Politics News
PM Prayut accused of cash bribes to MPs for censure support
On the third day of the censure debate in Parliament, PM Prayut Chan-o-cha responded to charges that he gave cash bribes to MPs to secure their support to vote in his favour at the end of the debate. Pheu Thai MP Visarn Techateerawat levelled the accusation, saying that in a third-floor room of the parliament building PM Prayut met privately…
- World News
Langkawi plans reopening amid high vaccination, Covid-19
Taking a cue from the Phuket Sandbox, Malaysia is launching a plan to reopen the tropical resort island of Langkawi in a similar fashion. The plan calls for a travel bubble to begin on September 16 in an effort to begin to restart the economy for Langkawi island which relies so heavily on tourism revenue and has been damaged so…
- Crime News
Extorted women held in chicken fighting dog kennel by fake police
A woman went out for a shopping trip but ended up at the centre of a bizarre story after she alleges she was arrested by fake police and detained in a dog kennel while being extorted for 50,000 baht. The woman was reported missing on Monday by her mother after she never came home from her shopping trip and today police arrested…
- Hua Hin News
Meme elephant Bunmee breaks into house 3 times, history of hijinks
You probably don’t know or recognise the name of 58 year old Hua Hin resident Supha, but you know her tragic and/or hilarious plight. The woman nicknamed Pa Yai (translated to English: “Big Aunty”), like many people in Thailand has to deal with the occasional pest in her house, rummaging through her food and making an unintentional mess. For many…
- Bangkok News
Bangkok ranked #1 best “workation” city in the world, Phuket #10
Bangkok has been ranked as the number one city in the world for a ‘workation’ – a portmanteau combining work and vacation – with Phuket also ranking in the top 10. The two Thai destinations ranked among the top cities in the world where people can get a break from their office life and have a holiday while still actively…
- Phuket News
No deaths, 2 Sandboxers with Covid-19 in Phuket
While Thailand has begun to see a downward trend in daily infections that is hoped to continue, Phuket’s infection trend has been rising over recent weeks. A few days this week have dropped to below 200 Covid-19 but today there’s been 238 new infections reported over the past 24 hours. The province extended strict entry requirements in hopes of curbing Covid-19…
- Politics News
PM Prayut accused of embezzlement in Sinovac vaccine purchases
Complex, tricky accounting, embezzlement or a government going about its work in the middle of a pandemic? Accusations by the Pheu Thai opposition party are demanding Thai PM Prayut Chan-o-cha explain a 2 billion baht gap between what was allocated for Sinovac vaccine purchases and what was actually spent. The charges, made under parliamentary privilege in this week’s no-confidence debate,…
- Pattaya News
Coffee shop attackers surrender, face assault charges
Police have taken into custody 2 suspects accused of beating a 23 year old coffee shop employee in Si Racha in Chon Buri on Monday. The pair of attackers face charges of assaulting the shop worker in the middle of the workday with other staff witnessing the incident turning themselves in yesterday. The suspects were identified as a 29 year…
- Covid-19 News
Study: recovery from Covid-19 gives more immunity than Pfizer
A new study appears to contradict previous data about the efficacy of vaccines, claiming that those who have recovered from Covid-19 previously have more immunity from the Delta variant than those who are fully vaccinated with the Pfizer and BioNTech vaccines. Conducted by Israeli researchers, it is the largest real-world study that compares the natural immunity people get from having…
- Covid-19 News
National Vaccine Institute defends opting out of COVAX
The chief of the National Vaccine Institute spoke out defending Thailand’s decision to forego the COVAX vaccine programme as the government comes under renewed fire as part of the ongoing censure debate. He maintains that Thailand is better off without the program. PM Prayut Chan-o-cha and the members of the ruling party in the cabinet are currently facing a vote…
- Covid-19 News
Mu variant as a Covid-19 “variant of interest” by WHO
By now, news of the Delta variant, a much more contagious strain of Covid-19 that has spread around the world, is well understood. Now, ‘Mu’, a new Covid-19 variant that may be resistant to vaccines, is making headlines as a new “variant of interest” according to the World Health Organisation. The Mu variant was first identified in Colombia 8 months…
- Covid-19 News
Bloomberg Covid-19 Resilience list has Thailand 5th to last
At one point, Covid-19 seemed like it may be under control and on its way out. But then the Delta variant emerged, throwing once-stable countries into infection chaos. Bloomberg compiles a monthly Covid-19 Resilience Ranking that tracks a number of metrics to rank what countries are the best to be in to weather the pandemic, and Thailand has fallen on…
- Pattaya News
Friends find body of man trapped under motorbike for 8 days
The discovery of the body of a man who died after a motorbike accident was made more tragic as police believe the victim survived the crash, but was trapped under his heavy motorbike, obscured by tall grass, just a few metres from a busy road. Nong Kham Police in Si Racha were notified this week after friends went looking for…
