Abysmal roads causes woman to give birth inside car in NE Thailand

A woman from Surin province, northeast Thailand, was forced to give birth in a car after dire road conditions prevented her from reaching the hospital in time. Locals want to raise awareness of the sorry state of road affairs in Khok Phued village in Ban Cham subdistrict.

Locals say the 2.5 kilometre stretch of “road” is the only entrance to the village of more than 125 households. It takes about 35 minutes to travel down the slippery, dangerous mud track, which is full of potholes. Locals compared the road to “the surface of the moon.”

Today at 3pm, 15 people from Khok Pheud village gathered to explain their plight to reporters. The villagers said that when people are sick, getting them to hospital safely is an impossible task. School students have to face the dangerous road every day. When it rains, the road is a death trap. No one should be forced to give birth inside a car, said villagers.

Villagers said the road has been this way for over 100 years, but the relevant agencies have never done anything to help, despite the road being located only 5 kilometres away from the Ban Cham Subdistrict Administrative Office.

One resident, 29 year old Oranee, told reporters that she was born in Bangkok and moved to the village to live with her grandparents when she was 14 years old. Oranee said the road was exactly the same when she moved to the village as a teenager. Now she is almost 30 and no repairs have been made to the road in that time.

The villagers hope that by getting the message out, the local administrative organisation will resurface the road, making life easier and safer for everyone in the village.

A few weeks ago, a man from Nakhon Ratchasima province sarcastically went fishing in the road to make a point that the potholes in his village are ridiculous and in dire need of repair.

SOURCE: Sanook