The Public Health Ministry has floated the idea of changing the daily announcements it makes on Covid-19 infections.
Under this proposal, "new cases" will concern the number of patients with severe symptoms and new deaths, instead of all patients as has been the case to date.
The ministry says the pandemic is lately dominated by the Omicron variant in which most patients have mild symptoms, if they show symptoms at all.
These patients are put in home or community isolation. By this reasoning, Dr Kiatiphum Wongrajit, permanent secretary for public health, said an announcement referring to all patients seems to serve no purpose.
In the last two years, the authority has kept the focus on all Covid cases to ensure people stay alert, and prevent hospital capacity from being overwhelmed.
The ministry feels this tell-all approach may no longer be necessary as the concern is no longer valid. Currently, about 60% of all Covid patients are receiving care under the government's Home and Community Isolation programme. Patients with mild and no symptoms make up almost 90% of total cases, according to the ministry.
While playing down total Covid cases might be good for be good for helping the economic recovery, the authority should not abandon the big picture.
South Africa, among other places, shows the Omicron wave might not result in an increase in deaths, but still causes infections far and wide that finally overwhelm healthcare services.
Indeed, the World Health Organization (WHO) still puts the focus on total patients, saying it is premature to confirm that Omicron will be less severe than earlier variants.
The WHO maintains that all Covid variants can cause severe disease or death, in particular for the most vulnerable people, so prevention is always key.
Some experts even branded the attempt to tone down reporting of Covid cases as a violation of the section 59 in the charter that enshrines the public's right to be informed.
Playing down Covid cases can also breed a false sense of security and make people less vigilant in the fight against Covid, a message the government has pitched for the past two years.
So, instead of trying to play down Covid cases, the government should ramp up Covid measures to boost confidence.
Indeed, current Covid preventive measures cannot inspire public confidence.
Only 28% of population have received a booster shot, which means the total population is not immunised against new variant.
Meanwhile, the government's plan to remove Covid-19 treatment for patients with mild and no symptoms from the list of conditions covered by the Universal Coverage for Emergency Patients (UCEP) scheme has caused public panic because the authority has not prepared assistance for patients with mild conditions.
Even though the ministry insists it has plenty of favipiravir pills to treat patients, the Rural Doctor Society, a vocal professional group, recently warned of a shortage in several hospitals.
The government must bear in mind that the achievement of Covid prevention rests on trust. To gain trust, the government has to guarantee that people will receive quality and timely care first and foremost.
Only once it has secured that public trust will the government have a free hand to play down Covid cases and pull treatments from the UCEP.
