Covid-19 cases in Thailand 'higher than reported'

BANGKOK • The actual number of Covid-19 cases in Thailand must be 10 times higher than reported by the Public Health Ministry as most patients develop mild symptoms, a prominent virologist has said.

Thailand yesterday reported 1,735 Covid-19 cases in the past 24 hours, down from the 2,378 reported a day earlier, and 15 new deaths from the disease.

Dr Yong Poovorawan said on Sunday that the number of children infected by Covid-19 has surged since schools reopened, triggering a spread among families. With children, he said, it was difficult to tell if they have the common flu or Covid-19.

"We expect Covid-19 to spread quickly from this month and the number of infections to reach their peak between July and September," he said.

He reckoned that Covid-19 infections will start dropping between October and December, before rising again next January, when respiratory diseases usually peak.

Dr Yong, who leads the Chulalongkorn University's Centre of Excellence in Clinical Virology, said half of the children who took part in the centre's study had been infected with Covid-19 but were asymptomatic.

"To achieve a real number, a sentinel surveillance must be conducted in each venue because the current Covid-19 infections report is based on patients who are hospitalised or tested positive via the RT-PCR method," he said, referring to the reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction method.

He added that patients with mild symptoms were less infectious than those with severe symptoms, and those with mild symptoms recover quickly.

Thailand's cumulative cases have numbered around 4.5 million since its first infections were detected in early 2020. Around 30,000 people have died of Covid-19 since then.

Meanwhile, Phuket announced on Sunday that it was easing its Covid-19 curbs now that the mask mandate has been lifted nationwide. Restaurants, pubs, bars and karaoke joints can now serve alcohol during their operating hours, it said.

THE NATION/ASIA NEWS NETWORK