Thailand oversea labors returned from disease detected abroad between 2554-2557: summarized and analyzed for the root causes

Abstract

       Since 1997, Thailand labors wishing to work abroad must receive a medical examination under the laws or regulations of the destination countries. The labors have to get health check with private hospitals received accreditation from Bureau of Laboratory Quality Standards, Department of Medical Sciences, while the governmental ones need no any accreditation. We have studied the retrospective data using the report data from Thailand Oversea Employment Administration, Ministry of Labor and Social Welfares, during 2011-2014. This paper has summarized statistics of Thailand oversea labors who are returned from disease detected abroad between 2011-2014. There are 242 labors (0.11%) who were sent back among 217,963 ones. The rate of return is likely to decrease, by year, statistically. However, the returned rate from the lung disease and tuberculosis [tend to increase statistically significant] 55.77% in 2011 to 76.19 % in the 2014. There are 99 out of 139 (71.22%) returned labors with lung diseases/tuberculosis and 52 such labors (52.53%) are examined from a governmental laboratory. Among such 19 returned labors who are eligible to be followed up for confirmation of the lung disease and tuberculosis, 11 labors (57.90%) confirmed normal testing results in Thailand. While another 6 labors (31.58%) use fake reports or fabricated testing results since the chest x-ray does not pass before travelling abroad or uses the report from withdrawn laboratories or it is not the one who get testing services from the claimed laboratories. There are only two labors (10.53%) who might have false negative results before traveling. The use of fake reports or fabricated testing results are also observed in the case of the returned labors getting positive testing results of Hepatitis B and Hepatitis C and the abused drug.