Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing whether "Bureaucratic Comfort" if you will should impact Thailand re-opening. There has been a lot of talk here recently in recent days about Thailand reopening October 1st, specifically Bangkok and if I use those words interchangeably Bangkok and Thailand, I really shouldn't. The country, greater Thailand is not Bangkok but Bangkok in a way very much for international tourism to a large extent I should say, Bangkok is the window to Thailand, so Bangkok being open has in my opinion a tremendous impact on tourism and the tourism economy here in Thailand as a whole. 

A recent article from the Thai Enquirer that is thaienquirer.com, the article is titled: Ministry of Tourism pushing for October reopening but some officials apprehensive. Quoting directly: "Phiphat, and that is Phiphat Rachakitprakarn that is the Head of the Tourism Authority of Thailand. Quoting directly: "Phiphat told reporters on Tuesday that the country was still on course to open up Bangkok to foreign tourists via the sandbox model by October 1. Under the plan, Bangkok and surrounding provinces will be open to vaccinated tourists who can travel freely between Bangkok and other sandbox'ed provinces including Phuket and Samui. Phiphat said it was imperative that the country opens up to save the economy and he said he has the blessing of Health Minister Anutin Charnvirakul. However senior health officials within the Ministry of Public Health," (and they don't quote these people's names. This appears to be someone anonymous), "told Thai Enquirer that there has been push back against the October 1 date." Quoting further: "According to the source, the advisors and doctors inside the Ministry are asking Phiphat and the Cabinet to postpone the re-opening and consider a November 1 date instead." Quoting directly from this anonymous source: "We would be a lot more comfortable pushing the date by just one month to November 1." Like I said that was from this anonymous source. Again, I urge those who are watching this, go check out Thai Enquirer, thaienquirer.com, the article is titled: Ministry of Tourism pushing for October reopening but some officials apprehensive.

So going back, "we would be a lot more comfortable", well happy day. I certainly really hope that folks in the bureaucracy are operating under the most optimal levels of comfort that they can but the fact is the economy is moribund; people are out of work. You talk about discomfort, people are completely displaced from their jobs, the economy is in a really precarious position. Quite frankly, where is the exigent need for this? Where is the emergency? We have been dealing with this now since March of 2020. It is September 2021. Bangkok, the red zones, whatever you want to call it have been under effective full lockdown since April of 2021. There has been virtually no SME Business activity especially in the retail sector, there has been virtually no SME business activity in the food and beverage sector. Restaurants are basically on the knife edge with respect to whether or not they are going to exist in a few months and we have to worry about the comfort, how comfortable people feel? and people feel. Let me be clear. If there was some expert out there with hard data that said we should not do this based on the following data, well that would be a different thing but this whole touchy, feely, squishy notion of "I don't feel comfortable" but providing no backup, citing no foundation based on any data driven analysis as to why this is a bad idea, I am sorry that to me is not good policy thinking, nor is it good policy making.

Myself, I agree with Khun Phiphat. I hope that we get reopened by October 1. The sooner we reopen the better if I am not making myself emphatically clear enough. We need to get our economy back. Look, at the end of the day and I am not going to get into a bunch of statistics because we have done it already on this channel. I cited them within a week of this video. The death rate is 1% of 1.8%. 1.8% of folks here in Thailand contracted have COVID. Of those people, 1% died of it. It is sad, it is terrible, I don't disagree with that. I don't want any people to die, that is not the point but more people are going to have tremendous problems in their life, including death, from an economic fallout the likes of which I don't know that I have ever even heard of because quite frankly these total lockdown measures are completely historically unprecedented. 

So just to wind myself back in here, the notion that we should be worried about what is comfortable, we "feel" comfortable, not we "think" based on the data that this would be the correct way to proceed. No, we just "feel" more comfortable. That has driven I think too much of the policy thinking to this point and we are now in a very bad position and we need to get our economy back on its feet and get moving on.