An on-again, off-again plan to install condom vending machines in public schools has exposed a rift between health and education officials.
On one side, science and good public health policy wants to see condoms available to all students age 13 and up to rein in teen pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases such as AIDS. The Public Health Ministry in September proposed the four-year plan to reduce Thailand’s exceptionally high rates of teen pregnancy.
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However since the start of the year, education officials have pushed back with disproven and unsound moral arguments that providing access to birth control and safer sex means endorsing sexual expression among youth.
“Vending machines should be in public restrooms and nightclubs,” Kamol Rodklai of the Office of Basic Education Commission said yesterday in a Khaosod English report. “If they are installed in schools, they will encourage the kids to be interested in having sex before their appropriate age. I do not think it’s right to proceed with the plan.”
Kamol cited no research or basis for his opinion but vowed to never sign off on the plan.
Meanwhile transmission rates of sexually transmitted diseases are increasing and health officials say condom availability is an essential part of reversing that trend.
“New [infections] are growing by 10,000 people per year,” said Taweesap Siraprapasiri, director of the National AIDS Management Center. “In this number, 40 percent of them are young people who are in their school years.”
Photo: Frank Kovalchek
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