OPINION

PM deserves more credit

Chairith Yonpiam in his Jan 16 article, "PM's words ring hollow over scandals", fails to give the Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha credit for his one consistently demonstrated skill: he excels at making up lame excuses that some people, amazing but true, actually manage to believe, or at least pretend to believe.

He made up pathetic excuses when he staged a coup to make himself PM: all lies, of course, but well designed excuses nonetheless.

He has made amazing promise after promise since he made himself PM absent the bother of a democratic election, and used committees and other neat excuses to deflect blame from his failure to anything save further the interests of Prayut and those he loyally serves in a mutual love fest.

Is vaccine ready or not?

The prime minister says that Siam Bioscience, a Thai pharmaceutical company, owned by the Crown Property Bureau, started to produce the AstraZeneca vaccine in December. According to a recent report, he went on to say that efficacy would take four months to establish. By my estimation this would make the AstraZeneca vaccine available to the public in April and not June as stated by the prime minister.

The question also arises as to why the AstraZeneca vaccine which has passed efficacy testing in the UK and is already in use, will take four months to test in Thailand while the Chinese vaccine which is being imported for use in February does not require any Thai efficacy testing?

There seems to be a need for more information regarding the Chinese vaccine in view of its low efficacy rating in Brazil. Clarification is also required as to the availability of the vaccine for expats living in Thailand as the American embassy has already said the decision rests with Thai authorities.

Don't knock the lockdowns

In his Dec 16 letter, Ban Bandit sees the lockdown and restrictions as "a form of insanity" because, at the time of writing this, only 67 deaths have been attributed to Covid-19.

Has he not considered the fact the low number of deaths is a result of lockdowns? If Thailand had gone down the same route as USA or Brazil, what would the death rate be? No one knows, but probably substantially higher than 67.

If the entire world had followed the path of Thailand, Vietnam and New Zealand and imposed strict lockdowns would we be talking about Covid-19 now? Would we need a vaccine? Just a thought.

Somsak's ignorant drug claim

Re: "Deadly drug contained 20 times the safe amount of diazepam", (BP, Jan 16). The article quoted Justice Minister Somsak Thepsutin as saying "Ten milligrammes of pure diazepam is considered fatal".

This is blatantly incorrect. It contradicts the statement made earlier in the article that diazepam is commonly prescribed in doses of 2, 5 and 10mg. However, even if a typographical error was made regarding the order of magnitude of the dose, and the article meant to say, for example, 100mg, this is still well below the dosage that would pose serious harm.

In fact, even if an amount of 200mg of pure diazepam was ingested, which is equivalent to the amount the article says was found in the substances near the deceased, this would not be fatal -- patients have been reported to recover from doses as high as 2,000 milligrammes.

Accordingly, diazepam is not a drug of preference for suicide attempts, but it does have a range of negative side-effects, including risk of dependence.

Nevertheless, the drug remains in widespread use because of its medical value in treatment of anxiety, as a muscle relaxant and in pre-operative sedation.

The important issue here is not the risk of fatality related to diazepam, but the fact that it can be life-threatening when combined with other drugs, in particular opiates (such as heroin), alcohol, or other depressants.

In the case of the "k-powdered milk" fatalities the "cocktail" apparently included heroin, ketamine and methamphetamine in addition to diazepam. While exact details of the composition are not available, it seems unlikely the amount of any individual drug included would pose a risk of death, but the interaction between diazepam and the others was what made the ingestion fatal.

This event has been a tragic loss of young lives, with profound impacts on their families and friends. Aside from the deep social issues and "structural determinants" involved in drug use, which demand serious examination, the incident highlights a widespread ignorance in the community regarding commonly used drugs.

This doesn't concern just the people responsible for putting together and selling the "k-powdered milk" cocktail, but also those in positions of power, such as the justice minister, who by his remarks revealed his own lack of knowledge regarding drugs.