THAILAND COVID-19 INFECTIONS SURGE

For months, Thailand had no confirmed cases of local transmission. Now, an outbreak is radiating outward from Bangkok’s elite nightclubs to its slums, prisons, construction camps, and factories, according to The New York Times Monday Briefing report

That’s hardly a new trend in Thailand, which has one of the largest wealth gaps among major economies. Many Thais have rigorously kept their masks on and obeyed lockdowns throughout the pandemic.

But the privileged few — the phuyai — continued to party. An ambassador and a government minister are among those linked to the clubs who have tested positive.

Thailand’s three waves of the coronavirus have crested in zones where the rich profit and defy COVID protocols. The first wave was traced to a stadium operated by the country’s powerful military, which makes money on sports gambling, and the second to a sweatshop seafood business, which depends on immigration officers turning a blind eye to trafficked workers.

“The phuyai destroyed the COVID situation themselves, and we, the small people, we cannot live,” said Mutita Thongsopa, a worker whose sister died after contracting COVID-19. “People are dying like falling leaves.”

Thailand’s surge is part of a late-breaking wave that has washed over much of Southeast Asia, where adequate vaccines are largely unavailable.

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