COPENHAGEN, DENMARK - DECEMBER 18: Climate change activists shave their heads in protest against the UN Climate Change Conference on December 18 , 2009 in Copenhagen, Denmark. World leaders will try to reach agreement on targets for reducing the earth's carbon emissions on this last day of the summit. (Photo by Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images)
These days, many university students are suffering because of high university tuition fees. Some people take time off school. In extreme cases, other commit suicide. Because of these cases, indignant people came together and demonstrated. During the demonstration, a women student wept when she had her head shaved.
To pay high university tuition fees, Many students have part time jobs. In one survey, over half of university students who had made money admitted that he money was mad illegally. In fact many university students don’t really think that university tuition is a problem.
Hundreds of anti-government supporters in Bangkok shaved their heads on Thursday in protest at Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva's government.
Men, women and children from the so-called Red Shirts protest group took part in this latest action.
The protesters want the Thai Prime Minister to dissolve Parliament and call new elections.
Many have been camping out on the streets of Bangkok since March 14, demanding the dissolution of parliament and calling for fresh elections.
Protest leader Suporn Atthawong warned Abhisit that if he "insists on staying in power, we'll use tougher measures in the future."
On Wednesday, Thailand's political battleground had shifted to Parliament, where opposition lawmakers boycotted proceedings in a protest against tight security imposed by the military amid the Red Shirt anti-government rallies.
Veteran health activist Preeyanan Lorsermwattana held a head-shaving protest yesterday to denounce the government's slow progress in pushing forward the draft bill on medical malpractice compensation.
Tiyamas Yothee, the mother of a boy who become disabled due to alleged medical malpractice, also joined the protest.
The 10-minute proceedings, held during a meeting of the tripartite panel studying the draft bill at the Food and Drug Administration, shocked officials and reporters.
"If the government doesn't move the draft bill forward, it may not be only hair next time," Ms Preeyanan said in tears after her head was shaved. "We feel we have been double-crossed. It's the government's promises that cannot be trusted."
Ms Preeyanan and Ms Tiyamas claim their sons developed crippling disabilities as a result of complications during birth that were caused by medical malpractice.
Ms Preeyanan filed a lawsuit against the Medical Council of Thailand in 2003 but her case was rejected by the Supreme Court last year.
Ms Tiyamas's son, two-year-old Chawarin Ongprasert, suffered brain damage and blindness due to complications during birth. Her case is still pending at the Criminal Court.
"This protest is not for myself or my family but for every Thai as they have rights to be protected by law from medical malpractice. We don't want to sue doctors. Why doesn't the government just do what they promised [push forward the bill]?" Ms Preeyanan said.
Mr Preeyanan, who founded the Thai Medical Error Network, has campaigned for enforcement of the draft bill on medical malpractice compensation, which she said would enable patients to depend on a new mechanism instead of filing lawsuits against doctors and hospitals.
She has attended more than 800 meetings over the past few years to help bring about the legislation.
The 49-year-old mother vowed to dissolve her network once the law came into force in a symbolic move to show that affected patients could now rely on the new mechanism under the law.
The controversy over the draft bill will come to a head again on Monday when supporters and opponents of the legislation discuss if the draft bill should be shelved or pushed forward to parliament for consideration.
Doctors are standing by their stance of dissolving the legislation process and starting public hearings, while health activists are calling on doctors to negotiate in detail during House and Senate panels instead.
The meeting, hosted by government chief whip Witthaya Kaewparadai, will be held at Government House.
Meanwhile, the tripartite panel appointed to seek solutions to the impasse over the draft bill has reached initial compromises on some issues.
Paijit Warachit, permanent secretary for public health and the panel's chairman, said some doctors and patient groups yesterday agreed that the name of the draft bill should be changed to the draft bill on the protection of patients and medical providers from damages caused by the public health system.
The panel also agreed that those receiving compensation under the law should not take their cases to criminal courts.
A mediation process will be excluded from the draft bill to avoid causing complications in the process.
However, both sides still have different views on major issues such as the definition of medical service standards and the composition of a committee considering compensation.
NEW DELHI - Hundreds of protestors in India and Nepal on Monday shaved their heads and donated blood in fresh protests over China’s crackdown against unrest in Tibet, witnesses said.
Those going bald included Indian Sikhs — for whom uncut hair is an article of faith — and a three-year-old girl.
“For Sikhs, it is a personal and political decision to grow your hair,” protester Baljit Malik, 70, said in New Delhi.
“Today I am cutting it for political reasons.”
Youdon Aukatsang, a member of the India-based Tibetan parliament-in-exile, said “shaving our heads is the strongest non-violent signal we can send.”
Others at the New Delhi demonstration, which drew hundreds of people from various faiths, donated blood for a local treatment centre “in honour of killed Tibetans,” Aukatsang said.
Tibetan exiles say more than 150 Tibetans have been killed in China’s crackdown on the protests against its rule of the Himalayan region. Beijing says Tibetan rioters have killed 20 people.
Mass shavings were also part of symbolic protests in the northern Indian hill town of Dharamshala, where the Tibetan parliament-in-exile is based, and in Nepal’s capital Kathmandu.
Aukatsang said Tibetan activists were planning regular protests in New Delhi leading up to the Olympic torch’s arrival on April 17.
Tibetan exiles in India have threatened to disrupt the torch relay, prompting Indian authorities to step up security for the event and shorten its route.
