The King who Cares
Born into a family of medical professionals, health and medicine had always been prominent in His Majesty King Bhumibol Adulyadej’s childhood. His father, HRH Prince Mahidol of Songkhla, was a pioneering doctor who dedicated his life to the plight of the rural poor. He initiated numerous healthcare programmes that brought medical care to the far reaches of the provinces, where modern medicine had previously been unheard of.His mother, the late Princess Mother, was a trained nurse who tenaciously supported her husband’s causes. After the death of Prince Mahidol, she continued to carry out his work and started numerous public health programmes.Growing up against a backdrop of dedication and service to public health, it comes as no surprise that His Majesty the King has followed in the footsteps of his parents and is an ardent advocate of health and medical concerns. While His Majesty, in recent years, is seen as being more active in areas such as rural development, water conservation and the environment, he has remained a compassionate champion of issues related to health and medicine since the end of World War II.At that time, state-run medical facilities in the provinces were scarce and under-developed. “During His Majesty’s frequent visits to rural areas, he would come across sick, malnourished people or those suffering from malaria who were desperate for medical attention and did not know where to get help,” says Magsaysay Award recipient Dr Prawase Wasi.“Since then His Majesty has traveled with a team of doctors and nurses to treat those who come to him with their illness. When he meets someone with a serious disease, he will write down their names before sending them off to the hospital. He’s been doing this for years. It gives people great hope to see him. It’s a cause that has stayed close to the King’s heart,” says Dr Prawase.His Majesty’s actions prompted a fundamental change in the attitude of healthcare authorities, says Dr Prawase. In the past the attitude and practice was that the ill had to go to hospital for treatment. By taking mobile medical teams with him wherever he went, His Majesty changed this attitude. “Medical professionals saw that they had to go out to the sick and not wait for them to come to the hospital. This led directly to changes in the structure of the healthcare delivery structure by the Public Health Ministry.”“[Doctors and health care officials] began to realise that medical treatment and public health care had to be distributed because that was the only way it could reach the people. They realised volunteers, health workers and nurses should play a role in this. This was the groundwork for what is now called ‘basic healthcare work’. I think that the King played a great role here in changing attitudes. And he did it without giving orders but by setting an example.”Apart from the official attitude to healthcare, His Majesty was also instrumental in encouraging villagers to care for themselves, first by adopting basic preventive healthcare measures rather than waiting until they fell ill. Wherever he went, His Majesty would advise rural residents on how they could take care of themselves.Apart from being instrumental in changing attitudes and actively assisting national health programmes, His Majesty has played a direct role in assisting the eradication of several diseases that were widespread in the country. After the Second World War, former public health minister Dr Sem Pringpuangkaew explains, the country’s most dreaded disease was tuberculosis.“The state did not know how to contain the disease because at that time there weren’t any sanitoriums to house those infected. The King, however, took a personal interest and set up the Anti-Tuberculosis Society to help prevent the disease from spreading,” he recalls.With a personal donation to the Red Cross Science Division, the Mahidol Wongsanusorn building was constructed in 1950 to produce BCG vaccines. UNICEF later bought the vaccines for use in other Asian countries.His Majesty was also instrumental in eradicating leprosy. Dr Sawasdi Daengsawang, then the director general of Public Health, was one of the first to turn to His Majesty when the disease became rampant in the mid-1950s. “I asked the King for help because at the time leprosy was spreading so quickly that in some cases in the Northeast, entire villages were becoming infected.”“In 1955 leprosy was everywhere in the streets,” says Khwankeo Vajarodaya, Grand Chamberlain of the Royal Household Bureau. “The Public Health Ministry had a plan to bring it under control in 12 years, but the King wanted it tackled much faster. A doctor told him that it could be done in eight years if there was an institution to train more professionals. So His Majesty set up the Rajaprajasamasai Foundation which also served as a research and development centre.“His foundation is directly responsible for dramatically bringing down the incidence of leprosy,” says Mr Khwankeo.Dr Vichai Chokevivat, Deputy Director-General of the Communicable Disease Control Department, agrees that His Majesty played a significant role in eliminating polio from Thailand. Apart from private donations to set up the Polio Welfare Fund and building the Vajiralongkorn Tarabambat building at the King Mongkut Hospital, he spearheaded the drive to raise funds for vaccines. His Majesty used his volunteer radio to call on Thais for donations to buy equipment to help those stricken with polio.The country responded. Mr Khwankeo notes that it was His Majesty who initiated the use of Jacuzzis to treat the disease and donated equipment to Siriraj Hospital.Polio was later eliminated from Thailand. It reappeared in the 1990s following the influx of Cambodian refugees 10 years earlier. Dr Vichai says that a campaign launched to inoculate all Thai children against polio proved highly effective: Only one child was reported to have contracted the disease. The campaign continued for three years until polio was eliminated from the country once again. “We have to recognise that we have reached this stage because His Majesty the King took an interest in the well-being of his subjects,” the doctor says.Since 1946, His Majesty has injected millions of baht of personal funds to assist numerous national healthcare programmes. The Thai Red Cross has been a primary bene- ficiary of HM’s support, especially in its work producing vaccines and serums. In 1952 His Majesty set up a blood service centre which developed into the National Blood Service Centre in 1969.At present the centre has branches throughout the country, saving thousands of lives each year. It produces saline drip for sale, while blood is distributed free of charge.His Majesty has expanded the work of the Red Cross to cover the whole country. His Majesty has assisted in providing funding for research on diseases relating to hormones, bones and joints, the nervous system and the blood. He has set up a fund for medical research, a foundation to promote cleanliness and health among schoolchildren, and a vocational centre for soldiers and border patrol policemen who have been disabled while protecting the country.In addition to His Majesty the King’s commitment to addressing current and future healthcare needs is his belief in funding the future development of Thai medical professionals.“There must be continuous training of people who are skilled and experienced in public health care”, says Dr Prawase.The late Princess Mother saw the importance of this and used personal funds to send many Thais to study medicine overseas. Dr Klum Vacharobol, Dr Sri Sirising, Dr Sawadi Sadaengsawang, Dr Luang Nit Vechavisit, and many other doctors who have become teachers of the medical profession were among recipients of the Princess Mother’s support. These people went on to play a crucial role in laying the foundation of medical and public health work in Thailand.His Majesty continued to support his mother’s work by establishing the Ananda Mahidol Fund to send doctors to further their education overseas. Dr Charas Suwanvela, former president of Chulalongkorn University, was the first recipient. Later the fund became a foundation and is now open to public donations.His Majesty allocates a considerable amount of time to the foundation, acting as its honorary chairman and paying great attention to its financing. Students under this foundation would be granted an audience with HM the King, during which they would be given invaluable advice before going overseas. On their return they would be granted another audience in which His Majesty would ask about what they had learnt. His Majesty would on occasion spend hours talking with them.As a healthcare advocate, His Majesty the King’s contributions remain immeasurable, and build upon the pioneering work of his late father and mother. Perhaps the best way to describe His Majesty’s attitude towards health care would be to use his own words. During a visit to a tuberculosis treatment centre on April 6, 1950, HM said to then Health Minister Luang Payung Vejchasart, “Is there a medicine that can cure this disease? If you lack any medicine I will find it for you. I want to see Thai medicine progress.”

The king who cares
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