A DOCTOR warned in a Facebook post that the coronavirus situation in northern Chiang Mai city has reached the breaking point with over a hundred patients emerging for days in a row and this contradicts the countdown to reopen the country to tourism on Nov. 1, Siam Rath newspaper said this morning (Oct. 28).
Dr. Rangsarit Kanchanavanich, professor of cardiology at Chiang Mai University’s Department of Internal Medicine, said the situation is dire in this city with patients overflowing overloaded hospitals, including ICU, and caregivers have to arrange to home, community and temple isolation for patients.
The condition in Chiang Mai is now close to the nadir point Bangkok reached earlier this year, he added.
However provincial authorities have asked healthcare workers not to say that “hospital beds are full or there are not enough beds” despite the fact that the number of patients is now beyond the capacity of the provincial health system to support with doctors, nurses and other healthcare workers extremely exhausted.
Dr. Rangsarit also said that since the current governor came in, the number of cases have skyrocketed and this province has now overtaken all the other northern provinces as being the worst hit.
There are no additional measures to control the disease with the focus solely on reopening the city to tourists, he added.
Even so, he agreed that in the long term people have to learn to live with coronavirus in a more balanced way because the economic problems are now becoming severe.
Meanwhile the Public Health Ministry said this morning the daily Covid tally rose to 9,658 cases and 84 deaths from 8,452 cases and 57 deaths yesterday.
Of the new batch of cases 9,440 were among the general public while 218 got infected in prisons and detention centres.
This takes the cumulative confirmed total since April 1 to 1,856,110.
Another 8,526 patients were cured while today’s 84 fatalities raised the death toll from April 1 to 18,912.
CAPTIONS:
Top: Rafting on Chiang Mai’s Mae Kok river. Photo: Ckmck (CC BY 2.0)
Home Page: Hotel in Chiang Mai. Photo: Stephanie Kraus (CC BY 2.0)
Also read: Bangkok Logs 702 Covid Cases Today As National Total Stands At 8,452
