A deputy official has revealed that Thailand’s prison population is 300,000 convicts.
Out of these 15,000 are foreigners and 9,600 of these are in for drugs offences.
Most of these are from Laos, Cambodia and Myanmar.
Out of the 300,000 population 1,170 died from illness in the last year.
Department of Corrections deputy Prawut Wongsinin told Komchadluek that big problems exist because foreigners in the prisons are often sick and don’t come under the Thai social security scheme.
They need to be treated to avoid infections being contracted by the general population and items like medication and surgeries do not come cheap.
The DoC is thus applying for 34 million baht to the Drug Prevention and Suppression Fund to treat the 9,600 inmates in prison for drugs.
This represents 3,600 baht a person.
Prawut said prior to this foreign embassies were contacted to help and patients were treated in government hospitals especially the Police Hospital.
