As the Kingdom's one million village health volunteers were essential to Thailand's successful containment of COVID-19, they will now get digital training to help them better care for people in their communities, further strengthening Thailand's public health system.

Minister of Public Health Cholnan Srikaew said that the nation's 1.07 million village health volunteers play a crucial role in advancing health security at the family and community levels. “As health care, both local and global, increasingly rely more on digital tools, the volunteers will be better able to serve their communities if they enhance their digital literacy and have access to a mobile application on their smartphones,” Minister Cholnan said.

Spread across all of Thailand's 77 provinces, 15,000 volunteers also provide health services in the capital city, Bangkok. They deliver health information, very basic medical care, and medicines, and monitor people's conditions and needs, referring them to doctors and public hospitals when necessary and reporting on outbreaks of disease when they occur.

The World Health Organization called the volunteers the "unsung heroes helping guard communities from COVID-19," on its website in 2020. "For four decades, Thailand's vast army of village health volunteers have helped their fellow citizens to keep safe from all manner of disease. Now the volunteers are helping to protect them from an epidemic unlike any they have ever faced."

A paper by the United States National Institute of Health said, "The system of primary health care in Thailand is one of the oldest in the world and is known worldwide for its success. Supporting the concept of community involvement, the Village Health Volunteer is the backbone of this health care delivery system."

Minister Cholnan said the Ministry would develop an app for the volunteers. He said it will be a powerful tool in facilitating their tasks, providing preliminary information on the health status of individuals under their care in their respective communities.

Photo courtesy of https://www.who.int/thailand/news/feature-stories/detail/thailands-1-million-village-health-volunteers-unsung-heroes-are-helping-guard-communities-nationwide-from-covid-19