BKK_BUS_SUP_September18_4

BUSINESS SUPPLEMENT
JUST THE STATISTICS
While bar charts, line graphs
and simple numbers are hardly
capable of providing the defining
answer to many economic, social
and political questions, they are
certainly a good way of obtaining a
general overview of any particular
subject.
Each month the Business Supplement
will look into a brace of
statistical information and provide
readers with what we consider to
be the central elements of these
figures.
Health expenditure in Thailand
is well below the global average
Public hospitals in Thailand are
notoriously over-crowded and the
staff are often over-worked and,
based on expenditures for the sector,
are almost certainly underpaid.
According to figures from the
World Health Organisation (WHO),
Thailand’s government spent just
3.4 percent of GDP on health expenditure
in 2005 and this had risen
to just 3.8 percent in 2015.
By comparison, Southeast Asia
as a whole saw health expenditure
rise from 3.6 percent in 2005 to 4.6
percent in 2015, although this was
still below the global average of
6.3 percent.
Cambodia spent 6.0 percent
of GDP on health expenditure in
2015, followed by Vietnam on 5.7
percent while Brunei invested just
2.6 percent. Of course, this may
be due to Brunei not needing to invest
as much in the health sector
because its population may well
be generally healthy compared to
its neighbours. This is something
the WHO figures can’t tell us.
Singapore
notably
saw its
health expenditures
rise from
just 3.0 percent
in 2005
to 4.3 percent
in 2015.
Again, this
may be due
to an ageing
population
or possibly
rising health
issues in the
city-state.
Thailand
ranks high in
cyber security readiness
Recently the Australian Strategic
Policy Institute (ASPI) released
figures for a group of selected
countries in the Asia-Pacific
region as they pertained to cyber
readiness. The weighted index
covered organisational structure,
legislation and regulation, computer
emergency response teams,
financial cybercrime, and government/business
dialogue.
The United States, not surprisingly,
rated at the top with an
overall score of 90.2, leading the
way in organisational structure
and financial
cybercrime,
while Thailand
ranked
in 13th place
with a score
of 54.0, just
behind Indonesia
(54.3)
and ahead
of Vietnam
(53.6) and
the Philippines
(49.9).
In overall
joint second
place were
Australia
and Japan
(88.0) followed
by Singapore (87.7) and
South Korea (86.8).
Thailand ranked equal ninth in
organisational structure and equal
11th in computer emergency response
teams.
The ASPI noted that new or
amended legislation and organisational
changes are leading to
an improvement in cyber policies
in some countries, although it
warned that many laws were emphasizing
censorship and attempting
to control dissent rather than
looking more broadly at genuine
security and curbing crime.
It also noted how more and
more countries are establishing
dedicated cybersecurity organisations,
taking responsibility away
from individual ministries like telecoms
and defence.
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