OPINION

Healthy options?

Re: "TAT touts wellness industry strength", (BP, March 24).

Tourism Authority of Thailand governor Yuthasak Supasorn compared Thailand's medical expenses with the US. He failed to realise the US and EEC and some non-EEC countries enjoy the status of 1st world, and the GDP levels are much higher than Thailand. The TAT governor may not be aware that many foreign patients moved to their neighbouring South Asian powerhouse India, where expenses are three times lower than in Thailand with a high quality of doctors and medical analysis while the medium of communication is English.

You have another category of patients who are much wealthier than the normal rich who moved to either Singapore or the UK, which signifies the quality of the medical doctors and the level of the holistic approach to patients.

Thailand is creating a world of "healthscare" instead of healthcare.

Instead of promoting so-called western scientific modern medicines, which are based on a fully false myth of so-called Western science, Thailand should focus on holistic therapy with Thai, Chinese and Indian herbal ancient Ayurveda.

Western medical science is only good for a quick fix and does not cure permanently. Every Western medicine has an ADR effect on the body, which affects the liver and heart. Many Western medicines contain chemicals which leak through the liver and go on to damage every organ possible.

We have the only best medical solution, which is called TLC (tender loving care), and for every disease, we can cure naturally and without putting all hope in Western medicines.

My request is to widen the awareness among the public and ask doctors to prescribe food as medicine. We have to save our future generations.

In this respect, I have to ask whether Anutin Chanvirakul, our health minister, is really fit for the job?

The whole world knows the effectiveness of Covid vaccines from China and Pfizer. Yet, the public health ministry bought those medicines to provide vaccinations to the public.

Wondering why no investigative reports have been published in any Thai media.

Real heroes needed

Re: "Lawyer Sittra asks Chuvit to clarify shady B50m donations", (BP, March 24).

Chuvit Kamolvisit, the self-proclaimed "Robin Hood", has suddenly fallen from grace after lawyer Sittra Biabangkerd accused him of receiving money from the boss of an online gambling operation whom Chuvit is exposing.

Chuvit admitted that he had received six million baht but had donated the money afterwards to two Thai hospitals for charity. While both parties will continue to accuse each other, media channels should now restrain from over-reporting Mr Chuvit's multiple cases. The media's objective in chasing viewer ratings is understandable, but their enthusiasm could favour alleged perpetrators.

Time will tell whether Chuvit is a true heroic Robin Hood or just another crook in the woods. In the real world, unfortunately, we can rarely find a true hero who performs good deeds without seeking personal benefits or remuneration.

Something missing

Re: "UTN introduces its economic specialists", (BP, March 24).

In the photograph supporting this report, it appears that the United Thai Nation Party proposes to formulate a national economic policy on the recommendations of a team of 13 men and one woman.

The storyline does not even name the lone woman. In a country where many household purse strings are controlled by women, that seems to be a huge anomaly.

Storms brewing

Re: "Hail strikes after cloud seeding ops", (BP, March 20).

Various areas of the North, such as Chiang Mai, were hit with hail storms last weekend, despite attempts by the Thai Air Force to use cloud seeding in order to prevent storm clouds from forming.

While I can understand why the authorities attempted to do this, one could view this as rather rash, considering that the area has been inundated with high levels of pollution recently. One benefit of the storms is that they can reduce the amount of fine levels of particles PM2.5 in the atmosphere for at least a short time anyways.

An unwinnable war

Re: "Bullying behaviour", (PostBag, March 18).

I read Jonathan Chance's emotionally uncontrolled reaction to a recent contribution where I outlined what I suspect to be Ukraine's present (and seemingly dismal) military options after an unexpectedly lengthy conflict with Russia.

I've never taught a child, so when the writer blithely says, "I certainly would not want [Mr Jellison] in charge of any children of mine", not only has he nothing to worry about but, given his own childish letter, I might ask if the only child this writer needs to worry about might be someone who is not mature enough to avoid publishing naive assumptions?

I simply again close by saying that I feel if we really want what is best for Ukraine's children today -- regardless of if whether it was right or whether it was wrong for Russia to invade Ukraine -- then I encourage President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to make peace in a war which his country clearly cannot win.

Animals are not toys

Re: "Snake charmer", (BP, March 10) and "Caged wild animals", (PostBag, March 7).

The referred picture depicts a golden python being played around with by "a presenter" at a shopping arcade, the same place that I referred to in my "Caged wild animals" letter. The picture caption also describes other animals, such as crocodiles and albino buffalos.

I would like to refer to the famous quote, "Mercy keeps the world going".

It should be reiterated that no wild animal deserves to be shown anywhere, including in exhibitions, zoos, aquariums, circuses, etc. All these places are not natural for wild animals.

Zoos abduct animals from their natural habitats and lie that it is about "species protection". They also get rid of "surplus" animals either by killing them or selling them to unethical exotic animal dealers.

The majority of species kept in zoos are not endangered. Children who visit zoos do not learn about wild animals' behaviour because they behave differently naturally in the wilderness.

It is the same with aquariums. Sea animals swim in vast oceans. They are captured from their ocean home and can only swim in endless circles inside tanks. They are often drugged to relieve stress caused by that and in order to manage aggressive behaviour induced by stress.

In circuses, animals are harmed by being trained with hurtful tools to perform naturally uncomfortable tricks for people to watch. Many animals used in circuses are bred in captivity and spend their entire lives in close contact with humans, which is unnatural and stressful for them.

Animals are not toys to be treated in those ways, such as in the shopping arcade's exhibition in the above news-in-picture caption by caging them in a closed environment and with many people getting close to them, making them feel stressed and depressed.

Don't ride elephants

Re: "Pattaya honours elephants as part of their heritage", (BP, March 14).

A photograph showed that while these hypocrites were "honouring" the elephants, they were riding them. Elephant riding is closely connected to the torturing of elephants.

Elephants do not naturally want to give rides. One reason for this is that their protruding backbones are vulnerable to injury, so the Thais horribly torture baby elephants for days to break their spirits so that they will cooperate and give rides. (If you have any doubts about that Google: "Elephant crushing".)

If this is how Thais treat elephants when they "honour" them, I won't even speculate on how they would treat elephants if they hated them.

Surviving city streets

Why did the chicken cross the road? To get to the other side!

But apparently not Bangkok chickens, who should be happy to get halfway across the road.

I'm referring to the traffic-light-controlled pedestrian crossings, where pedestrians who push a button are made to wait 60 seconds for the light to turn green, breathing in a soup of traffic fumes.

But this only gets them to the traffic island, where once again, a press of a button requires another 60-second countdown to finally get the green man and reach the other side.

No one is crossing roads to get to the middle. We want to get to the other side. Making pedestrians linger in a sea of traffic for two or more minutes is not the way to encourage people to walk more, which is sorely needed in our congested city. The longest pedestrians should have to wait for lights to change is 15 seconds to give drivers time to see the lights change, and two-phase lights should be completely removed -- give us more time to cross the whole street, not just half of it!

The offending crossings where pedestrians have to endure this include the Chong Nonsi "park", the Silom Road crossing at the corner of Pan Road, and the Rajadamri crossing between Lumpini Park's northwest corner and Chulalongkorn Hospital. Can traffic engineers reprogram these lights urgently to give us poor chickens a chance to get to where we want to go?