Northern Thailand
Lampang’s horses, and their caretakers, doing it tough

2020 has been a bleak year for horses and their owners in northern Thailand. Horses and their and caretakers in Lampang province are now starving. Travel restrictions due to the national state of emergency and the Covid-19 crisis mean no income for the owners, and no grass or hay for the horses to feed on.
A local rescue team presented 84 horse caretakers with aid packages and some cash yesterday as they’re making no income because there are no tourists. Many families are having a hard time making ends meet and have no cash for horse feed. The horse-drawn carriage business in Lampang may come to a stop if the situation continues.
Lampang is one of the few tourist locations in the world where there are still horse carriages. Narong Chairungroung, one of some 200 horse caretakers in Lampang, revealed that over 700 of their family members are being affected by the Covid-19 crisis. Narong says he has 11 horses and 2 carriages. He and his wife have been working for over 20 years in the horse carriage business and normally make about 300-600 baht per journey. The income has been enough to send his children to school and make monthly payments. But now, he says, he tries to find food from different sources every day, but there is no money to buy grass which is about 200 baht per day for the 6 horses.
37 year old Thitirat Kittikam, another horse caretaker, inherited his business from his father. He started at 18, a total of 19 years working with horses. His horses are getting thin as there is not enough grass every day to feed them. It has been 2 months since the horse carriages were ordered off the roads.
The vice-governor of Lampang has heard the voices of horse caretakers and the province is working with the Lampang Department of Livestock Development to provide grass and food for the horses.
Elsewhere in Thailand, an outbreak of African Horse Sickness is killing horses in their hundreds in Nakhon Ratchasima, Prachuap Khiri Khan, Chon Buri and Phetchaburi, some of them race horses worth millions. Stricken farmers want action from the government and are pondering legal action, saying the plague is the result of importation of African zebras.
PHOTO: Better days for Lampang’s horse-drawn carriages – thaizer.com
SOURCE: Thai Residents
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Coronavirus (Covid-19)
Mae Sot schools close after just 1 hour reopening when 5 students were found infected

All 15 schools in Mae Sot district of Tak province have been ordered to close again just 1 hour after the first day of school reopenings in the province, as 5 children tested positive for Covid-19.
Mae Sot City Municipality Office issued an urgent order to close all schools in the district after a vendor tested positive for Covid-19. At least 25 people who had been in close contact with the vendor were also sent to the Mae Sot hospital. The test results showed that 5 children, related to the patients were also infected, leading to the closure of schools until further notice.
Today is the first day that all schools countrywide, except for those in Samut Sakhon province, are allowed to reopen after being closed since the beginning of January due to the second wave of C-19 cases. The permission to reopen was in line with Centre for Covid-19 Situation Administration announcement as the situation of viral outbreaks had improved.
As of today, Tak records 144 cases, with 49 patients under treatment and 2 deaths. The country has accumulated a total of 19,618 infections since January 2020. Another 836 infections were reported today from the past 24 hours, the majority more cases discovered from active tracing and testing in the Samut Sakhon province.
SOURCE: Nation Thailand| Sanook
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Northern Thailand
Son lights himself on fire after asking mom for lottery money

A woman’s 32 year old son, in northern Thailand’s Phrae Province, is in critical condition from lighting himself on fire after falsely believing that his mother had won the lottery and would not share her winnings with him.
Police at Denchai Police Station were alerted of a man who burned himself in Ban Mai Jua, Denchai District and notified a rescue team at Somdej Phra Yupparat Hospital. 60 year old Pen, the auntie of the man, who is only identified as Tossapon, says she was having breakfast when she heard an argument.
When she looked out the window, she saw Tossapon on fire and wrapped in a blanket. She says he ran to a water hose and put the fire out, but not before almost catching his house on fire. Officials arrived and found that several items in Tossapon’s bedroom had been on fire, along with pieces of the blanket scattered throughout the house. They also found burnt pants and a pillow.
At the hospital, officials met 64 year old Sila, the mother of Tossapon, waiting for her son in front of the Emergency Room. Sila told police her son is a “psychiatric patient” because he used to use meth, or “yabba” in Thai. She says his addiction left him with long-term damages and says her son often falsely believes his mother won the lottery, to which she tells him she lost the lottery ticket.
Sila says she tells him it is not true, but this time Tossapon asked for proof and continued questioning her the next day. The mother says she described her love for her son, which upset him, leading him to wrap himself in a blanket and set himself on fire.
“Son, 99% of the love that I have for you has been changed to hate, the remaining 1% is technically loved because of the word ‘son’.”
SOURCE: Thai Residents
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Coronavirus (Covid-19)
Chiang Mai night markets reopening tomorrow

Night markets in Chiang Mai will be reopened tomorrow after the province went 6 consecutive days with no new Covid-19 cases.
According to Chiang Mai Governor, Charoenrit Sanguansat, the province and the provincial disease control committee agreed to ease up restrictions on social and business activities after the number of infections continually dropped and no new infections were reported during the past week.
As a result, flea markets, night markets, and walking streets across the province will be reopened tomorrow onwards.
However, the governor still reiterates that marketplaces and visitors must follow the disease control measures strictly.
Since the start of the second wave of Covid-19 in mid-December, Chiang Mai has tightened restrictions to prevent the virus spread in the province, with the order to close all markets and social activities for 14 days on January 6.
SOURCE: Nation Thailand
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