Thais Vaccinating Chinese in Thailand!
Coronavirus: 150,000 Chinese in Thailand start getting vaccinated; Singapore airport cluster likely linked to infected travellers
- Thailand agreed to begin inoculating the estimated 150,000 Chinese nationals living in the country after Beijing donated 500,000 jabs
- The airport cluster, which involves about 100 cases, is part of a resurgence of infections in the city state
Published: 10:19am, 21 May, 2021 (SCMP)
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A health worker administers a dose of the Sinovac Covid-19 vaccine to Chinese national Zhang Xiaohong at Bangrak Vaccination and Health Centre in Bangkok, Thailand, on Thursday. Photo: AP
Chinese citizens living in Thailand began being vaccinated on Thursday as part of China’s global campaign to inoculate its nationals living and working abroad.
China recently donated 500,000 vaccine doses, and Thailand agreed in turn to inoculate Chinese nationals as it slowly rolls out shots for its own citizens to contain a coronavirus surge that has sickened tens of thousands in the past two months.
Yang Xin, minister counsellor at the Chinese embassy, said Beijing’s “Spring Sprout” programme would benefit tens of thousands of Chinese in the country. An estimated 150,000 Chinese citizens live in Thailand.
China has so far supplied 6 million vaccine doses to the country, most of which Thailand bought.
The Thai government has said it will vaccinate Thais before inoculating most other foreigners, regardless of risk factors or age.
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Thai Buddhist monks receive the Sinovac Covid-19 vaccine at a hospital in Bangkok this week. Photo: EPA
Just over 2 per cent of Thailand’s 70 million people have received a first vaccine dose and about 1 per cent have received a second. The government hopes to inoculate 70 per cent of its people by the end of the year, but has been criticised for taking too long to start vaccinating.
China’s official People’s Daily newspaper says more than 500,000 Chinese citizens in more than 120 countries have benefited from the “Spring Sprout” vaccine programme since it was launched in March.
In downtown Bangkok, a Chinese volunteer with a white mask, transparent shield and blue gloves stood in front of a red banner reading “Spring Sprout Action” flanked by the flags of China and Thailand at a vaccination centre.
A dozen people waited to get a cursory medical check as nurses, accompanied by a translator, gave Chinese-made Sinovac shots in another room.
“I am happy and proud to be able to get a vaccine on day one organised by my government,” said Zhang Xiaohong, 40, who runs a logistics company in Thailand.
Qin Qing, a 39-year-old real estate broker in Bangkok, said she was a bit nervous before getting the shot and felt slightly dizzy afterward. “I am grateful for my country and the embassy, and people who help to make it happen, from airline staff who fly the vaccines here to Thai medical workers,” she said.
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A volunteer helps Chinese nationals register for vaccination at Bangrak Vaccination and Health Centre in Bangkok on Thursday. Photo: AP
Thailand had largely contained coronavirus cases last year by closing its borders, enforcing mandatory quarantines and actively tracing contacts of those found to be infected. The measures devastated its lucrative tourism
industry but kept the pandemic at bay, for the most part, until early April.
Then a surge that began in high-end nightspots in central Bangkok spread rapidly as people were allowed to travel during a mid-April national holiday.
On Friday, Thailand detected its first 15 domestically transmitted cases of the highly infectious Covid-19 variant first found in India.
It reported 3,481 new cases and 32 deaths on Friday, bringing the total to 123,066 infections and 735 fatalities overall.
A partial lockdown in recent weeks has made limited headway in containing outbreaks, especially in Bangkok and in prisons.
The capital has been hit especially hard, with thousands of cases surfacing in slums, crowded low-income housing and camps housing construction workers.
Thailand has a population of about 70 million. More than 2.5 million are from neighbouring countries, including Cambodia, Laosand Myanmar. Many are employed on construction sites and in factories.
Chinese nationals are the most numerous foreigners living in Thailand who are not from neighbouring countries. They are the only foreigners being vaccinated under the “Spring Sprout” campaign.
Natapanu Nopakun, deputy Foreign Ministry spokesman, said on Thursday there are around 1.3 million legal migrant workers in Bangkok and its vicinity and more than 1 million illegal ones across the country. The Labour Ministry intends to inoculate them as well because their high mobility is a risk factor in curbing infections.
Another 200,000 foreigners – from Australia, Japan, Europe, the United Statesand elsewhere – are mostly professionals and retirees. For now, they can only obtain Covid-19 shots by travelling overseas and would face lengthy, expensive quarantines on their return.
Groups representing Americans living in Thailand sent a letter to US Secretary of State Antony Blinken last week asking the government to supply some of the millions of unused vaccine doses available in the US to inoculate American citizens in Thailand.
The Centre for Covid-19 Situation Administration, headed by Thai Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha, on Friday approved the extension of a nationwide state of emergency through the end of July as the deadliest phase of the outbreak to hit the nation so far shows no signs of easing, according to spokesman Taweesilp Visanuyothin. The decree, which allows the government to streamline disease-control plans without multiple approvals from various agencies, has been in place since March last year.
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