Inter Press Service - December 2, 2003
Marwaan Macan-Markar

Particularly objectionable to the students is what health officials have in mind: placing condom-vending machines in universities and other institutions of higher learning as a way of promoting safe sex.

This display of enlightenment from the country's halls of learning has brought into the open the deep divide about what policy is suitable to curb the spread of HIV among this South-east Asian country's youth.

On the one hand, the student leaders who have opposed having condom dispensers on campuses have received unqualified support from a range of quarters, including the editor of the country's English daily, the 'Bangkok Post'.

Making a case on the other hand for condoms to be easily accessible to the country's increasingly sexually active students are health officials and a few political leaders.

"Drop your ego at the door and accept reality. It (unsafe sex among teenagers) happens and we cannot prevent it, can you? But condoms can help make it safe," Dr Praphan Phanuphak, director of the Thai Red Cross AIDS Research Centre, told a seminar on HIV this week.

But on Dec. 1, World AIDS Day, 'Bangkok Post' editor Veera Prateepchaikul wrote in a commentary saying that Thai halls of learning should be kept condom-free.

"Several opponents to this proposal, myself included, would like to pose the question to the Communicable Disease Control Department that if the practice of casual sex has spread to the younger age group such as those in the (secondary school) level, will the department consider extending the condom dispensing service to high schools as well?" Veera asked.

These views have gained momentum since student leaders representing a network of 105 higher-learning institutions voted Thursday last week to oppose the department of disease control's plans to place condom-vending machines in universities by early next year.

"We agreed that the timing is not right and that (the plan for condom dispensers) is not the best solution to fight the AIDS problem," Vitoon Chomchaipol, secretary-general of the Student Union Network, was quoted as having told 'The Nation' newspaper following the vote.

"Casual sex is a problem involving a small group of students," he said, adding that "with easy access to condoms, the majority, who are reluctant now, will jump onto the bandwagon."

Under the health ministry's plan, the condom machines would be dispensing two-piece packets, each to be sold at five baht (about 11 U.S. cents), as opposed to packets of condoms sold at 20 baht (about 50 cents) at other vending machines in shopping malls.

The timing of this debate is apt, serving as a counterpoint to the praise Thailand received this week during events to mark World AIDS Day.

Bangkok's high-profile drive in the early 1990s to promote 100 percent condom use in the sex industry was hailed as a model for other countries to follow.

At one time, to achieve that goal, Thailand was distributing up to 60 million free condoms annually in the early 1990s.

"There was no other country that matched Thailand in this area. It was a major success, this focus on a brothel-based condom campaign," Hakan Bjorkman, deputy resident representative at the Thai office of the United Nations Development Programme, said in an interview.

Local agencies working to quell the disease have numbers to support such an achievement. "Because of that campaign, we estimate that two million people were saved from being infected by HIV," Sombat Thanprasertsuk, director of the Bureau for AIDS, Tuberculosis and Sexually Transmitted Infections, told IPS.

At present, the country has close to 700,000 adults and children living with HIV/AIDS out of a population of 63 million people. Since HIV was first detected in the 1980s, over 300,000 people have died from the pandemic.

The number of new HIV cases being reported reflects the impact condoms have had in keeping infection rates down. Currently, it has dropped to about 20,000 cases annually, as opposed to 143,000 new infections reported in 1991, states the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS).

Yet studies done by Sombat's agency are drawing attention to a worrying sign that the country can least ignore - the deadly cocktail of complacency over the initial success in combating HIV and the group that has become most vulnerable of succumbing to the deadly disease, the youth.

Over the last five year, the proportion of male students in Grade 11 in high school who are sexually active has risen from 10 percent to 13 percent, says Sombat. "But the real figures could be higher."

What worries him, however, is the relatively low use of condoms among these youth. "Less than 30 percent of the male students are using condoms, and the level of condom use is not increasing with the pace of the sexual activity among these students," he said.

Surveys done by the health ministry offer the chilling consequence of such unprotected sex. An estimated 78,000 Thai youth between the ages 15 to 24 have been infected with HIV, states one survey.

Thus, both Bjorkman and Sombat see the plan to introduce condom dispensers in universities as one way of countering rising infection rates. "We know that more students are engaging in sex, but are shy to get condoms," said Sombat. (END/IPS/AP/HE/ED/DV/MMM/JS/03)

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