Provincial authorities have stepped up preparations for quarantine to handle more people returning home through all modes of transport.
In Songkhla, officials prepared the Pru Kangkao stadium as a quarantine place for 29 of around 100 Thai Muslims who will return from a religious ceremony in Sulawesi, Indonesia, on Monday evening.
The 100 returnees are from Narathiwat (9), Pattani (19), Yala (10), Satun (33), Soongkhla (25) and one each from Bangkok, Chiang Rai, Samut Prakan and Krabi.
In Kalasin province, 1,439 of the 16,305 returnees from Bangkok have already been cleared after 14-day quarantine, according to the governor.
In Narathiwat, the governor said the province has prepared 29 quarantine places in all 13 districts with a total capacity of 1,000. Most of the places are military bases, state buildings but there is also a 32-room hotel in Sungai Kolok. The province has 22 confirmed cases and one in quarantine.
In Sa Kaeo, 79 Thai workers have been isolated for 14 days by authorities at designated places in different districts. They returned to Thailand from Cambodia from March 30 after all casinos were shut down in the neighbouring country.
In Aranyaprathet district of this border province, 79 of them stayed at 13 designated places, including the Pa Mok Dhammaram Buddhist centre, where they also learned dhamma and helped with the centre’s chores. Food and drinks were donated by local people. None of them has had a fever, according to the chief monk at the centre.
Meanwhile, the Human Rights Commission on Monday recommended two measures involving state quarantine.
First, after rooms are sanitised, fast screening by rapid tests should be conducted on all returnees. A suspected case should then be tested again using the reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) method, which takes 2-3 hours. If the person tests positive, he can be sent for treatment promptly. This measure aims to prevent a quarantine place from turning into a source of infection, it said.
The commission also recommended one room per person, except when they are relatives or friends who agree to stay with each other.
The second proposed measure is apparently in response to reports three people were put in the same room at the Sattahip facility after a number of returnees were sent from Suvarnabhumi airport on Friday. Some of them refused to stay at the facility for this reason and were sent back to the airport.
