diff --git a/src/common/evtloopcmn.cpp b/src/common/evtloopcmn.cpp
index 711ada6006..ee1244ff4b 100644
--- a/src/common/evtloopcmn.cpp
+++ b/src/common/evtloopcmn.cpp
@@ -30,6 +30,23 @@
     #include "wx/app.h"
 #endif //WX_PRECOMP
 
+// see the comment near the declaration of wxRunningEventLoopCount in
+// src/msw/thread.cpp for the explanation of this hack
+#ifdef __WXMSW__
+
+extern int wxRunningEventLoopCount;
+struct wxRunningEventLoopCounter
+{
+    wxRunningEventLoopCounter() { wxRunningEventLoopCount++; }
+    ~wxRunningEventLoopCounter() { wxRunningEventLoopCount--; }
+};
+
+#else // !__WXMSW__
+
+struct wxRunningEventLoopCounter { };
+
+#endif // __WXMSW__/!__WXMSW__
+
 // ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 // globals
 // ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
@@ -59,6 +76,8 @@ int wxEventLoopManual::Run()
     // should undo
     wxEventLoopActivator activate(wx_static_cast(wxEventLoop *, this));
 
+    wxRunningEventLoopCounter evtLoopCounter;
+
     // we must ensure that OnExit() is called even if an exception is thrown
     // from inside Dispatch() but we must call it from Exit() in normal
     // situations because it is supposed to be called synchronously,
diff --git a/src/msw/thread.cpp b/src/msw/thread.cpp
index 736663b38a..d6115306bb 100644
--- a/src/msw/thread.cpp
+++ b/src/msw/thread.cpp
@@ -86,6 +86,16 @@
     #define THREAD_CALLCONV WINAPI
 #endif
 
+// this is a hack to allow the code here to know whether wxEventLoop is
+// currently running: as wxBase doesn't have event loop at all, we can't simple
+// use "wxEventLoop::GetActive() != NULL" test, so instead wxEventLoop uses
+// this variable to indicate whether it is active
+//
+// the proper solution is to use wxAppTraits to abstract the base/GUI-dependent
+// operation of waiting for the thread to terminate and is already implemented
+// in cvs HEAD, this is just a backwards compatible hack for 2.8
+int wxRunningEventLoopCount = 0;
+
 // ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 // constants
 // ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
@@ -755,7 +765,7 @@ wxThreadInternal::WaitForTerminate(wxCriticalSection& cs,
 #if !defined(QS_ALLPOSTMESSAGE)
 #define QS_ALLPOSTMESSAGE 0
 #endif
-        if ( !wxEventLoop::GetActive() )
+        if ( !wxRunningEventLoopCount )
         {
             // don't ask for Windows messages if we don't have a running event
             // loop to process them as otherwise we'd enter an infinite loop