Cash pledge to woo visitors

HERE is an insurance policy that guarantees both a great holiday and provides handsome death benefits: Visit Thailand this week and if you die from Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), the government will pay two million baht (about RM200,000) to your next-of-kin. The only premium you have to pay is the flight ticket to the kingdom. 

With its tourism industry badly mauled by SARS and the war in Iraq, the Thai government has gone to great lengths to show that the outbreak is under control in the country.