About 80% of officials, working at the office of the permanent secretary of Prime Minister’s Office, have been told to work from home, as the government takes steps to try to contain the spread of the third wave of COVID-19 infections, reportedlytriggered by entertainment outlet clusters in Bangkok.

An urgent circular letter was sent from Mr. Thirapat Prayoonsith, permanent secretary of PM’s Office, today (Friday), to heads of departments to instruct their officials to work from home until April 21st and to monitor and communicate with their officials, on regular basis, to ensure they are performing their duties.

They were also advised to keep abreast of CCSA updates on the COVID-19 situation.

Workers disinfected all the offices in the Government House today, including the media rooms.

Meanwhile, all executives and staff of PTT Public Company, at its head office, have been advised to work from home until April 25th, after an executive vice president was found to be infected with COVID-19 yesterday.

Worapong Nakchatree, director of the Centre to Follow Up and Monitor Emerging Diseases at PTT, said that the unnamed senior executive attended a meeting of the board of the Federation of Thai Industries on March 29th and, on April 5th, he was informed that one of the meeting participants had contracted the virus. He immediately went for a test, which confirmed his infection yesterday.

He said that those in close contact with the infected executive have been advised to stay home and self-isolate for 14 days,while the rest of the staff and management were told to work from home.

The PTT head office has also been disinfected, he added.