Thailand’s prime minister won plaudits for steering the country successfully through the first year of the coronavirus pandemic. But as cases rise and the vaccine rollout falters, big business and ordinary Thais alike have unleashed their anger and frustration at the government.
The criticism has been stoked by the sharpest rise yet in infections in the kingdom, which medical experts have linked to the faster-spreading variant of the virus first identified in the UK.
Thailand’s plan to vaccinate up to 50 per cent of its 70m population this year, and 70 per cent by 2022, has until now been based almost entirely on a single vaccine: the Oxford/ AstraZeneca jab.