The Samut Sakhon province of Thailand is seeing a surge of cases that threatens efforts to contain the virus and the residual effects the virus has on the economy. A 1,000-bed field hospital is being set up in the province, close to those infected to reduce the transmission through travel to receive medical care. There are cases being reported in a dozen other provinces due to this surge and contact tracing is being used to track and test contacted people and identify high-risk areas.
The economic recovery of Thailand will be slowed and the global economy will likely be impacted as well by the increase of covid cases abroad. Thailand saw its biggest daily spike in recent months, with 576 cases reported on Sunday, almost all of whom were people quarantined after coming into the country from abroad. Localized largely in the Samut Sakhon province, many of the people infected are migrant workers or were linked to a seafood market that has since been closed. This outbreak concerning people traveling into the country threatens Thailand’s efforts to relax the rules allowing visitors to save the tourism industry, one of Thailand’s biggest sources of revenue.
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