Eight measures are being rolled out to deal with the spread of COVID-19 in the densely populated Khlong Toey community in Bangkok, which houses about 80,000 registered people and an unknown number of unregistered dwellers.
In his Facebook post today (Tuesday), Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha detailed the following measures:
- Pro-active screening in 39 communities, with top priority given to 20 communities where infections have been detected. At least 20,000 are to be tested, with a minimum of 1,000 per day, to be conducted by a mobile labs.
- Those tested positive will be separated from their communities and grouped into green, yellow and red categories, according to the severity of the symptoms. Then they will be sent to the pre-admission centre at Nimitbutr stadium, or to the holding centre at Saphan Temple or to the field hospital in Samut Sakhon province.
- Those in the red category, or the severe cases, will be immediately sent to a general hospital operated by the BMA. A new field hospital, equipped with an ICU and 432 beds, has been set up at Chalerm Phrakiat Hospital in Thung Khru.
- High-risk people will be quarantined at home until they are notified of their test results. During the self-isolation period, they will be provided with food by their community leaders.
- A vaccination campaign to inoculate at least 50,000 people in two weeks, after which an additional 30,000 people will receive vaccine shots, to achieve 60% inoculation of the Klong Toey’s population.
- Plans to set up more field hospitals in Khlong Toey by the BMA and the Public Health Ministry.
- Logistic support such as provision of food, medication, protective items and other necessities.
- The remaining 49 districts in Bangkok must follow the Khlong Toey model in making preparations to cope with possible further COVID-19 spread.
The prime minister said he will closely monitor the situation in Khlong Toey and, if necessary, make adjustments to the measures to slow the surge to controllable level.
City Hall began inoculation of Khlong Toey inhabitants today, aiming to inoculate about 1,000 people a day for ten days.
