Infection rates fall in capital, docs say

Infection rates fall in capital, docs say

Covid-19 infection rates in Bangkok have fallen, according to an active case study by rural doctors.

The Rural Doctor Society Facebook page yesterday said 7,227 people had tested positive among a total 69,115 people. It was issuing the third update of active case finding over the past four days.

The finding was counted as 10.5%, less than the previous update (16.1%).

The testing used antigen test kits. It was found that 1,992 (13.5%) people tested positive from a total of 14,715 last Wednesday, and 3,298 (10.8%) tested positive from a total of 30,407 last Thursday.

Antiviral favipiravir pills were prescribed to patients, it wrote.

After two testing blitzes last month, Rural Doctor Society chairman Supat Hasuwannakit said 20 teams had found more than 7,000 people tested positive from 51,000 people in crowded communities of Bangkok.

The National Health Security Office has been working with 38 rural doctor teams across country to deploy 400 medics to participate in the study.

Of 38 teams, six were from the North, 10 from Central regions, two from the East, 12 from the Northeast and eight from the South.

The active case finding has set a target to test 250,000 people between Aug 4 and 10, as well as provide Covid-19 vaccines to elderly and chronic diseases since last Friday.

Those who test positive will be brought to undergo RT-PCR tests to confirm the result. They will later receive green chiretta or favipiravir to be treated in home isolation.

Thailand amassed 138 Covid-19 fatalities and 19,983 new cases over the previous 24 hours.

The new daily caseload was lower than 20,000 for the first time since Aug 3.

There were 19,633 cases in the population at large and 350 among prison inmates.

The Centre for Covid-19 Situation Administration (CCSA) said that of the 138 deaths, 60 were reported in Bangkok and 35 others in the surrounding provinces of Samut Prakan, Samut Sakhon, Pathum Thani and Nakhon Pathom.

The remainder were distributed around 23 other provinces, it added.

Bangkok logged the most new cases, with 3,080, followed by Chon Buri (1,476), Samut Sakhon (1,391) and Samut Prakan (1,137).

The country also registered six imported infections -- five Thais who crossed the border into Tak and one into Narathiwat, according to the CCSA.

The CCSA reported 18,503 Covid-19 patients were discharged from hospitals after making full recoveries.

Since April 1, when the third wave of Covid-19 began, there have been 727,642 Covid-19 patients, 508,089 of whom have recovered.

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