The 2007 issues of the Thai Health Report, like the previous three, takes a broad, multi-faceted view of health. The flower on the cover, lamduan, is the official symbol of elderly people in Thailand, and elderly people are this year's special topic. The reason for focusing the elderly is not, as some might guess, because the new government is composed mainly of elderly people. Instead, it reflects current trends in the Thai population. Thailand is slowly becoming an aging society. The proportion of the population aged 60 or over was 5.5% in 1980, 7.4% in 1990, and 9.5% in 2000.

The ten important health issues considered in the report include, for the third time now, conflict in the South. This conflict continues to affect the lives of people in the South and throughout Thailand. It is intractable and complex. Many different strategies for resolving the conflict have been tried and have failed. Violence in the southern border provinces features in the news every day, and even appears to be worsening. We can only hope that the various parties to the conflict will soon cooperate to find a solution.

A complete list of the 14 indicators is: (1) dementia: an Epidemic on the horizon; (2) occupational health; (3) mental illness; (4) happiness; (5) risk factors for cardiovascular disease; (6) risk from secondhand smoke; (7) hazardous waste; (8) food supplements (9) consumer protection; (10) income, savings, and debt; (11) the suffi ciency economy; (12) Thai young people gambling to get rich quick (13) Thai young people in the cyber age. (14) educational inequalities.