a travel ban for all foreigners entering thailand. some critics of the government have been arrested for allegedly spreading false information about the coronavirus pandemic. the curfew was cut from 10–4 to 11–4, then 11-3 and officially ended on 15 june 2020. early april 2021, bangkok's entertainment venues were ordered to be closed for 2 weeks. mid-april 2021, schools were ordered to be closed for 2 weeks, taking the 2000+ daily cases into consideration. since 26 april, more businesses including gyms closed for 2 weeks. tracking application since may, the authority adopted a tracking application named "thai chana" (lit. thai wins) to track people who had entered an enclosed building, then would send a notice to anybody who were in there at the same time with a covid-19 patient if later tested positive. however, critics questioned its benefits and there were reports of spam. wastewater surveillance study from faculty of medicine, chulalongkorn university report sars-cov-2 rna was present in the human wastewater collected from both the bangkok city center and suburbs with increasing concentrations from october to december. this is the first dataset related to sars-cov-2 rna in wastewater in bangkok. except for july, august and december there were no statistically significant differences in rna copy numbers from the city center or suburbs. between october and november, a sharp rise in copy number was observed in both places followed by two to three times increase in december, related to sars-cov-2 cases reported for same month. interestingly, in december, the number of sars-cov-2 rna copies from the city center and suburbs in wastewater increased, reflecting the increased number of positive sars-cov-2 patients. study result suggests that a higher copy number of the viral genome could correlate with an elevation in infected people in the community and positive cases may be much higher than the reported numbers. health education public education focused on self-monitoring for at-risk groups, practising hygiene (especially hand washing), and avoiding crowds (or wearing masks if avoidance was not possible). communication prayut ordered crackdown on social media posts that the government deemed "fake news," accusing the people who did so of hampering the authorities' effort against the pandemic. the police also stressed that the crime may faced with a maximum of two years imprisonment under the emergency decree. in july 2021, after numerous reports of homeless people dying in the streets of bangkok, some officials blamed the incidents as being set up to discredit the authorities. vaccine a vaccination center at srinakharinwirot university in bangkok in november 2020, the authorities ordered 26 million doses of vaccine from astrazeneca, which reported 70% overall efficacy. it requires two doses of vaccine per person, so the quantity ordered would only cover 13 million people. prayut cabinet later approved budget for ordering 35 million additional doses in january 2021. siam bioscience, a company owned by king vajiralongkorn, will received technological transfer for co-investment. the authorities would also imported two million doses of vaccine from sinovac biotech, a chinese company which thai conglomerate charoen pokphand invested in, during february to april 2021. likewise, the thai government also stepped up its attempt to produce its homegrown vaccines amidst criticism, with "chulacov19" and set to begin trials in may 2021. phase i testing of the ndv-hxp-s vaccine began at mahidol university in march 2021. the 1.5 million dose of pfizer vaccine donated by the us government arrived in thailand in early august 2021. half of the said amount were allocated to health workers, even though the ministry of public health said earlier that all would be allocated to them. some hospitals reported allocation cuts. impact economy 2020 gdp growth rate forecast by asian development bank(by percentage) sources: asian development bank (adb) bangkok airways announced a plan to cut their executives' salaries, reduce the number of flights, and cancel some routes; staff will be on leave without pay for 10–30 days starting from 1 march 2020 due to the economic downturn and the outbreak of covid-19. the united nations industrial development organization released a report in june 2020 reported that 90% or more of firms expect revenue loss of more than 50% compared to last year.: 1 automotive sectors had a drop in manufacturing performance index (mpi) in april 2020, about 82% year on year, showing the lowest production since 1987.: 2 four other leading negatively affected sectors include petroleum and petroleum products, malts and malt beverage, air conditioning systems, and sugar.: 2 on the other hand, sectors which had an increase in mpi include concrete and cement, medicine, electronic circuitboard, frozen seafood, and animal feeds, of which mpi increased ranging from 10% to almost 40% year on year.: 2 in september 2020, world bank forecast that thai economy would contract 8.9% by the end of the year. education on 29 february, the 38th thailand national book fair and 18th bangkok international book fair at impact, muang thong thani were cancelled. it was instead hosted online, making it the first "online national book fair" of thailand. chulalongkorn and mahidol universities, following the confirmation of covid-19 cases among its staff and student body, began suspending classes on 16 march, while kasetsart university took the same action as a precautionary measure. sports lumphini park, a public park in bangkok closed due to restrictions imposed in 2021 the "thai fight" boxing tournament in chiang rai has been postponed indefinitely due to concerns of covid-19. on 1 march 2020, the football association of thailand decided that all thai league professional football matches in t1, t2, t3 and t4 between 7 and 31 march will be played behind closed doors as broadcast only events. however, on 4 march 2020, the decision was changed to postpone all matches prior to 18 april indefinitely. the 2020 motogp thailand grand prix was postponed due to the spread of the virus. the event has been put off until the outbreak has abated. the 41st bangkok international motor show, which was originally scheduled between 7 march to 5 april, has been postponed. the new schedule will be announced later. channel 7 boxing stadium will continue fights behind closed doors as broadcast only events, according an official statement by the channel. tourism grand palace, a major tourist attraction in bangkok, gone empty with no foreign tourist. (june 2020)yaowarat, one of bangkok's crowded tourist street became empty during the pandemic. (may 2020) thailand's tourist industry, which accounts for one-fifth of gdp prior to the pandemic, has been severely affected; the tourism authority of thailand anticipates total tourist arrivals for 2020 to decline by as much as 65%. in the january–march period, foreign tourist arrivals fell by 38% to 6.69 million; chinese arrivals, the largest source of inbound tourists, plunged 60% to 1.25 million. with its border closed and most international flights cancelled since 4 april, tourist arrivals and spending have both dropped to zero in april, compared to 3.2 million arrivals and $4.6 billion's worth of receipts in the same month last year. legend siam, a theme park in pattaya, will temporarily close from 3 march because of the lack of tourists during the spread of the virus. the park management promised to hire all staff back when it eventually reopens. on 16 march, the ministry of public health announced that songkran holidays and celebrations will be postponed until further notice as the number of cases continued to rise by 33 to 147. the songkran festival in khaosan road, khon kaen province, pattaya, bang saen beach and patong will not be held, according to each municipality's announcement. the dates of the holiday are to be postponed as well. ko pha-ngan district chief somchai somwong made the decision to suspend a party on rin beach to avoid the gathering of tourists, which could pose a risk of virus outbreak. the party had originally been scheduled on the full-moon night of 8 march. brian tan and shreya sodhani at barclays argued that the need for quarantine would mean "the return of tourists could be relatively slow". xenophobia and racism a restaurant in chiang mai displayed a sign which read "we apologize we are not accepting chinese customers. thank you", after a customer left the restaurant upon noticing a group of chinese people inside. the police demanded that the sign be taken down, but suggested that it could be rewritten in chinese as "we ran out of food". a similar sign was seen outside a restaurant in ao sane beach in phuket. health minister anutin charnvirakul posted negative comments on twitter about "dirty" westerners, saying they "never shower" and are more likely to spread the virus than asians. the post attracted negative reaction in thailand and the uk and was quickly removed. mr. charnvirakul stated the tweet was posted by his staff and not by him personally. online hate speech against myanmar surged after the december outbreak among migrant workers in samut sakhon. prayut blamed the covid-19 resurgence on illegal immigration. criticism of government response the government has been criticised for various aspects of its response to the crisis, especially over its early handling of the pandemic, slow procurement of vaccines, and the april 2021 outbreak. in early february 2020, in response to concerns over hoarding and price gouging of face masks, the government issued price controls and intervened in their distribution. the move failed to prevent shortages among hospitals, and became a scandal over perceived corruption and siphoning of supplies. criticism was also aimed at the government's inconsistent policy over international travel and quarantine requirements, indecisiveness and slowness to act, and poor communication—many official announcements were made available to the public, only to be quickly retracted or contradicted by other government units, and later changed. the abrupt closure of bangkok businesses prompted tens of thousands of workers to travel to their hometowns, reflecting the failure among agencies to coordinate a unified response. after the virus's third wave in april 2021, the government was criticized for failing to acquire a sufficient stock of vaccines. possible spread to other countries this is a dynamic list and may never be able to satisfy particular standards for completeness. you can help by adding missing items with reliable sources. south korea on 4 february 2020, a south korean woman, who recently visited bangkok on a vacation, was tested positive and confirmed as the 16th case of the country germany on 4 march 2020, cologne city government announced five confirmed cases, including a woman who was previously on vacation in thailand and is believed to have been infected there. australia on 5 march 2020, queensland government confirmed that an 81-year-old man who has recently returned from thailand tested positive and was admitted to sunshine coast university hospital. india on 6 march 2020, india reported its 31st confirmed case. the patient is an indian national who has a travel history from thailand and malaysia. egypt in may 2021, the uk authorities reported that they found a covid-19 variant that was first discovered in thailand from immigrants from egypt. transition to endemic management on 1 june 2022, the ministry of public health shut down its covid-19 location tracking app morchana in anticipation of endemic classification of the disease. the decision was made given improvements in the local situation, and since arriving people are no longer required to use the app. the ministry plans to declare covid-19 an endemic disease on 1 july, with that from 23 june 2022, mask wearing is optional outdoors at the countryside areas (such as phuket and don mueang) whereas mask wearing is still mandatory at indoors and at crowded areas such as bangkok and on public transport. on 8 august 2022, anutin charnvirakul, the chair of the national communicable disease committee announced that covid-19 would be downgraded from a "dangerous communicable disease" to a "communicable disease under surveillance" as part of the country's plan to enter a normal endemic period. statistics