Regent’s School Teacher Adam Pickles Showing Signs of Recovery ‎

 

CHIANGRAI TIMES – Neil Clappison, friend of teacher Adam Pickles who is in a coma following an unprovoked attack in Thailand say he is showing signs of recovery. Adam Pickles has overcome pneumonia and a fever and is now breathing unaided, while he recovers from the brutal attack which left him needing emergency brain surgery.

It is now more than three weeks since Adam Pickles was hit with a metal bar by an attacker – believed to be a Westerner – who drove off, leaving him for dead.

He had only just recovered from a horrific motorbike crash which had also left him in a coma, missing the birth of his son Benjamin, now eight months old.

Yesterday, Mr Pickles’ friend, Neil Clappison, 40, said: “We had a couple of scary moments just before the weekend. He caught pneumonia and had a fever as well.

But he has overcome both. The first ten days or so were critical – that was the danger zone. He had passed through that before the infections and seems to have fought them off.

He is now regulating his own body temperature and breathing 60 per cent unaided, so he seems to be getting better. He needs less and less support every day.

We are hoping that he is going to be out of intensive care in the middle of next week but that is just a guess at the moment.

Meanwhile, his friends – as well as strangers – have raised £33,000 for his continued care, the majority of which has been given by generous donors who have joined a group on social networking site FaceBook. As of yesterday the group numbered 6,800 members.

Mr Pickles’ insurance company has also agreed to pay about ten per cent of the estimated £70,000 costs of hospital care and repatriation. His hospital care bill alone is £2,000 per day.

Mr Clappison said: “I would imagine that most of the people donating have never met Adam but people are still getting involved. We are getting an awful lot of donations from strangers.

We are finding it really overwhelming how generous people are. It really does restore your faith in human kindness when you see first-hand how many people are donating every single day.

Adam Pickles has lived in Thailand for seven years and is head of English at the Regent’s School in Pattaya. The school is holding a sponsored event called Pattaya to Pickles to raise money for Adam. There are also fundraising activities planned in the UK.

For further information or to find out how to donate, visit donatetoadam.org.

 

We have had little or no help from the Foreign Office or British Consulate. There are many logistical problems surrounding Adam’s situation that we believe Adam and his family, as U.K. citizens, should receive help with.

Adam’s parents are with him in Thailand but only have a limited stay due to their visas and they may have to leave the country before Adam comes out of the coma. Also, Adam’s passport is missing, and obviously he is unable to say where it is. A replacement will take up to 8 weeks to arrive, but with luck Adam will be out of the coma in 2 to 4 weeks, so we may be unable to get him back to the U.K. even when he is able to be moved.

There is little or no investigation being carried out into who carried out this horrendous attack on Adam, or why they did it. Knowing the answers to these questions would help in Adam’s insurance case (see below).

We believe that a U.K. citizen in a situation like this should be able to expect some aid from the U.K. government, both financially and with these logistical problems.

If you agree please e-mail bellinghamh@parliament.uk, using “ADAM PICKLES” as the subject and stating that Derek Laud suggested you write. This is the e-mail address of an advisor to William Hague, the Foreign Secretary.

 

Adam is insured through the school he works at as Head of English but his insurance company was refusing to pay out. They said they need to speak to Adam. Adam is in a coma and will remain in one for at least another 2 to 4 weeks. They also said that his insurance policy does not cover him if he is involved in a “brawl”. Adam was hit over the head with an iron bar in an unprovoked attack, his skull was smashed open and he was left for dead in the side of the road, this is way beyond a “brawl”.

The cost of keeping Adam in hospital while he is in a coma is £2,000 per day, plus there is the cost of the brain surgery required to save his life and remove fragments of skull from his brain and the cost of his medication. On top of this there are the medical repatriation costs of getting Adam back to the U.K. once he is well enough to be moved.

Adam’s insurance company  have now agreed to honor their policy and pay up. The actual amount is not known yet, and unfortunately but this is a great victory. They specifically asked for this to be mentioned on Facebook, which shows the power that this campaign has had. Very well done to everyone who pressured them into seeing sense and making this decision.