SE Asia - Thailand most Dangerous Tourist Destination for Aussie Travelers:

I have seen others comparing SE Asian Countries as Holiday/ alternate Living destinations, saw this earlier and thought it was informative enough to share here;

Thailand most Dangerous Tourist Destination for Aussie Travelers:​

12:53pm Oct 6, 2017

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Thailand is the most dangerous tourist destination for Australian travelers, with 203 Aussies dying and 74 going missing in the popular holiday spot in the last year.

The figures come from the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade's annual Consular State of Play report.

According to the report, New Zealand was the most popular travel destination in the last year, with US and UK following while Thailand was the fourth most-popular destination.

In 2016-17, there were 1615 Australians who died overseas, up nine percent on the previous year.

Thailand had 203 Aussies die on its shores, down one percent from the year prior.

It was followed by the Philippines (126), Indonesia (107), the US (99) and Vietnam (87).

Illness was the leading cause, accounting for 446 deaths overseas while natural causes was responsible for 350.

Accidents represented 211 of the deaths while there were 68 suicides and there were 45 Australians murdered overseas.

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Just this year a number of Australian deaths overseas have made headlines. Emily Collie was killed in Thailand in February this year when the jet-ski she was riding collided with the one her boyfriend was riding. Matthew Bate died in San Francisco in June this year after being hit during a bar fight and Sara Zelenak lost her life during the London Bridge terrorist attack in June.

Thailand also accounted for the most hospitalisations, with 195 Australians ending up in hospital while 155 needed medical help in Indonesia.

USA came in third (117), followed by New Caledonia (103) and Vietnam (71).

Thailand also topped the missing persons cases with 74 Australians going missing in the south-east Asian nation.

The USA accounted for 59, followed by Indonesia with 43 missing persons cases.

China (mainland) had 35 while the Philippines had 28.

When it comes to Australians being arrested or detained overseas, the USA had a total of 285 with 116 Australians detained for immigration reasons while 169 were arrested by the law enforcement.

China (mainland) arrested 101 Australians, with 92 of those law-enforcement related.

United Arab Emirates had 104 cases, with 29 of those related to immigration while the final 76 were law issues.

Thailand also appeared on this list, with 100 arrests with the bulk (82) related to law-enforcement cases.

Philippines rounded out the top five with 68 arrests of which 62 were law related.

When it comes to Australians serving sentences overseas, similarly to arrests, the US tops the list with 52 Australians behind bars.

Almost half of the cases were sex-offenders, according to the Consular State of Play report.

China has 50 people behind bars, with the cases related to fraud or drugs.

In Vietnam, there are 34 Australians in jail with almost all the cases drug-related.

Thailand has 26 Australians in jail and once again the cases are related to drugs.

In New Zealand, 25 Australians are in jail with cases including sex assault, drugs and theft.

Thailand most dangerous tourist destination for Aussie travellers

 

In the case of transporting drugs: What will you do if corrupt (airport/port) workers, security, police or goverment put/place drugs in your belongings/luggage and then put you in jail or force you to pay big sums to get rid off the case?

There is a case where probably airport workers was placing traces (0.38 grams) of marijuana into the Marlboro box of an irish traveller.

 

I don't remember the TV show now, but is was about expats doing time in foreign prisons. Most of these "upstanding" citizens were transporting large amounts of drugs...WTF, if you are dumb enough to know or somehow clueless that you now have 10 kilo of extra baggage it is really on you.

I've rarely had a bag checked going into any country and have never had anything that would lead to me being detained.

I still live in a world where I get drug tested and maintain a clearance so the thought of being that stupid actually baffles me.

If I was "set-up" for drugs or the bullet thing that we all heard about I am not sure how I would react...I guess it would depend on how much it would cost vs. going after them legally.

It is pretty easy to be a decent person either travelling or staying overseas.

Shawn

 

Are you sure you will get away after paying the bribe? It can happen that they will try to get more money out of you and other foreigners. There are cases where corrupt police using minor girls to trap foreigners for misusing minors.

 

There should be a list around where corrupt police/governments are operating big money scams. (I mean not the low money scams for few $ for a fake traffic penalty.) This as a prevention to keep innocent people away from such spots. Not all police is bad on the Philippines. We should not have to run away from a country just because of highly corruption in few areas. Better warn the people to stay away from there.

 

Reading all your posts on this thread (and many on other threads) I have to say what a hard-edge, no-nonsense, extremely analytical person you are ... and I admire that. But then I guess you would not be doing your sensitive job (sshhh!) unless you are highly intelligent ... or are you going to slam me down with reports of colleagues who are not. I need correcting at times and my friend Mr Dude is not here now :(