Prominent Thai doctor well known for continually warning against allowing in foreign tourists warns against any plan to let in vaccinated tourists without a quarantine or even a reduced quarantine. - The Pattaya News

Reopening Thailand's border to vaccinated tourists could lead to another Covid-19 domestic pandemic if we are careless, leading Thai doctor and lecturer warns

Thursday, 25 February 2021, 18:13

Bangkok –

Reopening the border for foreign tourists after the arrival of Covid-19 vaccines could lead to another disaster if Thai people have loosened their strict health measures, Dr. Thira Woratanarat, Chulalongkorn University's Faculty of Medicine lecturer, warned on a social media post this week.

The doctor has pointed to recent global statistics of Covid-19 infections and a lack of data regarding the efficiency of Covid-19 vaccines against the disease transmission on his Facebook post yesterday, February 24th.

The status reads: "If the efficiency of the vaccination is still limited, or has not covered asymptomatic spread, then the transmission would continue and the domestic cases would rise, especially when people started to lower their guard, thinking that we already have the vaccine."

"Therefore, if we lowered our guard and became careless, even though we are vaccinated, another domestic outbreak could quickly occur when the country's border was reopened again."

Thira further concluded that everything is not safe yet, so people should strictly abide by the preventive measures, closely monitor their health and seek doctor treatment immediately if they have any symptoms.

Thira has been covered multiple times here at the Pattaya News for his ultra cautious approach, warning many times that he is strongly opposed to bringing back tourists until the pandemic has subsided around the world. He has previously warned against ASQ, golf quarantines, and has been strongly opposed to lowering quarantines from fourteen days, even if one is vaccinated.

He has stated the tourism industry must focus on domestic tourism and should stop being so heavily reliant on foreigners in general, stressing self sustainability.