In its weekly report, the DCD said 3,961 patients were hospitalised from December 4 to 10, or an average of 566 patients a day.
The DCD said 107 people had died of Covid during the period, an average of 15 deaths a day. The number of Covid deaths since January 1 has reached 11,694, the DCD added.
The department said a total of 143,250,945 doses of Covid vaccines have been administered — 57,095,546 first doses, 53,579,321 second doses and the rest were third or later doses.
The DCD said that as of December 10, 649 patients were still being treated for lung infections and 385 of them needed ventilator support.
Manoon explained that new Covid strains, which have spread in India, would be detected in Thailand soon.
He said Thailand should get prepared to cope with the spread of XBB variant not long after the spread of the BA.2.75 variant like what had happened in India.
The doctor explained that the XBB variant was much more infectious and it could evade immunity from vaccines and natural immunity from previous infections.
Yong said the infection rate tended to increase during the rainy and winter seasons similar to the spread of influenza.
Yong said the infection rate would decline after February and would rise again in June when the rainy season starts.
He added that by next year, almost all Thais would have immunity against Covid.